Bowman’s Strickland gets quickly up to speed

Updated: May 25, 2011 11:05PM

Cornelius Strickland isn’t one of those kids who has been running track his whole life.

“I started in eighth grade,” the Bowman junior said. “I was just trying to get through it. I was trying to be cool.”

There were some tough times in the early going, especially when the wiry 6-foot-3 sprinter started competing against older runners in high school.

“My freshman year, I was losing meets, I was getting down on myself,” Strickland said.

Through it all, though, plenty of people had his back, from his coach, Toure Douglas, to his parents and friends. And now Strickland is one of the state’s rising stars.

At last week’s Crown Point Sectional, Strickland faced a who’s who of area sprint stars, including returning triple state champ Jarvis McMillian of Hobart, Merrillville’s Rahim Conwell and Lew Wallace’s Brelen McGee.

“He was so ready for the sectional,” Douglas said, and it showed.

Strickland beat them all and ran season bests of 10.54 seconds in the 100 meters and 21.71 in the 200. That makes him the clear favorite in both events at today’s Valparaiso Regional, the final qualifier for the IHSAA state meet June 3 in Bloomington.

It’s all going according to plan for Strickland and Douglas.

“We want to peak at sectional and maintain through state,” Douglas said. “I’m very pleased with his progression. When he was a freshman, he was not the fastest kid around. His work ethic has made him what he is now.”

Douglas saw potential in Strickland, but didn’t know it would be realized so soon.

“We did, but didn’t expect him to be this dominant,” Douglas said.

Strickland made it downstate last season, finishing fourth in the 100 in 10.89, and helping the Eagles finish fourth in the 400 relay.

An indication of Strickland’s progress is his improvement in the 200, an event that he didn’t make the regional in last season.

“I like the 200 better (now),” he said. “I was kind of scared doing the curves. Now I’m more confident.”

All along, Douglas has been working with his star sprinter on the finer points of the 100 and 200 in an effort to drop a few tenths here or there.

“We did some things to tweak his starts and that paid off tremendously,” Douglas said.

While Strickland could probably qualify for state with less than his best effort today, the plan is to keep the pedal to the metal.

“The whole goal is to get better each week,” Douglas said. “We want to improve our times each week.”

“My mindset is, I’m ready to get it over with,” Strickland said. “I’m nervous, but I’m excited. You never know what’s going to happen at any track meet.”

That’s true, but based on the past couple of seasons, Strickland setting the pace in the sprints seems like a pretty safe bet.

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