Tough competitor
Elizabeth Wardsworth stopped and thought for a few moments.
How best to describe junior hurdler Madeline Fuchs, the first-year University High School girls track coach pondered
“She’s a real cute kid, an interesting kid,” the coach said. “She’s so nice – she’s one of those kids that people just like to be around. She’s smart, she’s athletic, and when she’s getting ready for an event – holy cow – she’s in the zone. She just goes out there, warms up, puts her game-face on and runs.
“She’s bubbly and sweet normally. But when she competes … She’s not mean or snippy or anything like that. She’s just focused. She’s a competitor.”
That inner fire has Fuchs ready for the state’s ultimate races, earning berths in two events at this week’s state track meet.
At the beginning of the season, Fuchs was a natural pick to reach the state Class 4A track and field meet in her best event, the 300 low hurdles. Now the junior finds herself in the field for both the 100 and 300 hurdles for this weekend’s state meet at Edgar Brown Stadium in Pasco.
Fuchs owns one of the state’s fastest times in the 300 hurdles going into the state meet, and her regional time Saturday moves her into the company of the state’s elite times.
Perhaps the biggest hurdle Fuchs has cleared this season was a bout with bursitis in her left knee at the start of the season, a condition that idled her for the first three weeks of spring practice.
If ever an athletic picked a good time to miss practice, the first three weeks of the 2008 spring sports season was it. Fuchs missed out on snow, rain, freezing rain and miserable weather.
Still, she said, if she had a choice, she’d rather compete.
“I hated sitting out,” Fuchs said. “But you gotta do what you gotta do, I guess. I was able to do some work on the stationary bike and I could do a little light jogging. If I could find some light drills that I could do without making my knee hurt, I could do those. But that was about it. For the most part I just had to keep it iced and rest it a lot.
“I came back pretty fast – I surprised myself.”
On the eve of the final weekend of the season, Fuchs said, she’s feeling 100 percent.
“It’s been frustrating because my times have been so inconsistent this year,” she said. “But I’m finally getting to the point where my times are back down there where I want them to be. With the other girls there to push me, and me there to push them, it’s been great fun competing right now.
The most elegant of track and field’s events, the two hurdles races require a different approach. The 100, with barriers set at 33 inches high, is an all-out sprint. The 300, with hurdles set at 30 inches, is a test of endurance as well as technique.
“In the 100, the big focus is speed and power,” Fuchs said. “You have to make sure you get your trail leg high and through and out in front of you. In the 300 hurdles, yeah, you want all of those aspects, but you have to pace yourself a little bit more. It’s a little more forgiving. If you drop your trail leg a little too soon, it’s not going to hurt you that much.”
For Fuchs, the 300 hurdles have been her No. 1 event.
“When I started out with track, I pretty much focused on the sprints,” she said. “My coach introduced me to the hurdles and that was pretty much it as far as I was concerned. I tried doing the triple jump, but I kept hurting my knee so I just concentrated on the hurdles.”
Coming back from the injury, an interesting thing happened: her times started to fall and her technique solidified in the 100 hurdles.
“That was a real surprise for me,” she said. “My sophomore year I wasn’t three-stepping consistently at all. This year I came back from an injury and bam, I was three-stepping the whole race through and I was really smooth. All of a sudden I was right there running alongside Kelly McNamee (of Ferris), and I had never done that before.”
Fuchs ran a hand-timed 15.4 second 100 hurdles, and her electronic time of 15.76 at Saturday’s regional meet in Richland made her a close third behind McNamee, who turned in a 15.67, and Richland’s Galia Dietz, who’s run the Eastern Region’s fastest time this season at 15.08.
“Maddy’s best event has traditionally been the 300, but she’s been improving so much in the 100,” Wardsworth said. “We were thrilled that she made (the state meet field) in the 100. We figured the 300 was pretty much her area, but she’s been really knocking down her time in the 100. Right now, it would be tough to say which one is her better event.”
Perhaps the most exciting element of a state championship meet is the surprises. Personal best efforts are the rule, not the exception.
“I’ve been looking over the state field,” Wardsworth said. “It looks good. It’s going to be a tight race.
“The one thing I know is that Maddy’s best races are still in her.”