Whips' Walker strikes gold

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In the Walker household in Hampshire, winning state titles, or at least competing for them, is becoming a family tradition.

Quinn Walker, however, can say something that no other male athlete in Hampshire history can say. He is the first individual state champ from the school.

He dashed to the finish line in 38.12 seconds during Saturday's Class A 300-meter hurdle race. The second-place competitor, Pana's Eric Miller, finished second in 38.91. Walker was ahead by a full hurdle after 100 meters. He held the lead and easily won the title at O'Brien Stadium on the campus of Eastern Illinois University.

"I was chopping my steps but I corrected it instantly," said Walker. "I did not hear anything and was just concentrating on my performance. When the gun goes up, I was just thinking about getting out and charging as hard as I could. I went out as hard as I could and did the best I could. I did not let down at all. It is awesome to be a state champion."

For the record, Quinn's father, Stanley Walker, was a member of the 1976 Hampshire football team that won the 1A state title in football. His sister, Western Illinois University basketball player Amanda Walker, was a member of the Hampshire hoops team that finished second in 2004. She was also a part of the team that took third in 2003.

"I may tease my older sister a bit, but my dad is a state champ in his own right," said Walker. "I thank God for giving me this ability. This is for the track coaching staff at Hampshire as well. My dad and my sister were my motivation. My little sister is next. She is a great athlete and she will probably get one as well."

Prior to cruising to the state title in the 300 hurdles, Walker finished third in the 110 high hurdles. He finished the race in 14.72 seconds. The winning time was posted by Tuscola senior Tyler Carter, who ran a 14.42. Walker was only 7/100ths of a second from the second-place effort.

"He has been down here three years and he knew exactly what needed to be done," said Steve Bruhn, Hampshire's coach. "Since he was in two events, we did not want him to dwell on any one event for much time. That was the best advice I could give him."

Walker set the school record in both hurdle races. He is also a member of the 400-meter relay team, which also holds the school record.

By placing in the two hurdle events, Walker collected his third and fourth state medals. He was third in the 110-meter highs as a junior. He took eighth in the 300-meter hurdles last year.

"When I started coaching Quinn, I helped him improve several things about his hurdling," said Matt Campbell, Hampshire's assistant coach and former EIU hurdler. "First, he needed additional endurance. In the 110s, he was dragging his leg across the hurdles and we corrected that. I am happy that I was able to use my hurdle experience to help another athlete win the state title."

In other Class A action, St. Edward finished fifth in the 400-meter relay. In an extremely close race, the Green Wave crossed the finish line in 42.96 seconds. Matt Ardiente, Eric Guerrero, Nick Kerger and Ryan Gilbert made up the Green Wave squad. The first-place team, Herrin, finished in 42.91.

"Fifth in the state is not bad at all," said Ardiente, one of three seniors on the team. "This was a perfect day. Everything was great today. We did not run well on Friday and felt like we needed to redeem ourselves. We feel like we did that today."

Ryan Page was one of four athletes that tied for eighth place in the high jump. The Genoa-Kingston jumper finished with a leap of 6-feet, 3-inches, as did three other jumpers.

The winning leap in the high jump was 6-7 by Matt Hassler, a senior from Spring Valley Hall. With the medal, Page has three medals. No other Genoa-Kingston has more than two.

"We were a little disappointed," said Ryan Jerbi, G-K's coach. "We were not disappointed with his performance, but he had a great day on Friday, which was a sub-par (weather) day. Today was a great day as far as the weather, but he had a bad day. He has cleared higher, but it just did not happen. It was great that he got a medal."