‘Best feeling in the world’: West Central junior Liam Schmeichel claims first state championship
West Central junior Liam Schmeichel let out a triumphant roar of victory as he crossed the finish line in the Class A 110-meter hurdle state championship race.
Schmeichel finished the race with a 14.68 time, a new personal record and the new high mark in Class A this year. The win marked the first state championship win of his track and field career.
“It feels amazing. I knew it was going to be a hard race so I gave it my all,” Schmeichel said after his state title victory. “It’s the best feeling in the world.”
Madison’s Shane Veenhof was right behind Schmeichel throughout the race and finished just .05 seconds behind him. Knowing how close Veenhof was, Schmeichel knew he had to be perfect going over each hurdle to stay in front. His focus: staying low to the hurdle and just taking it one hurdle at a time.
“The other guys got really fast out of nowhere so I knew I had to step my game up and just run my race,” Schmeichel said.
Schmeichel entered the weekend the number one seed to win the 110m hurdles having ran a 14.74 second race earlier in the season. He finished second in preliminaries on Thursday, only behind Veenhof, with a 14.93 time.
It’s been a long, arduous journey for Schmeichel on his path to winning his first state title. The West Central junior has run the hurdles since eighth grade and has competed in a hurdles race during the state meet for four years. Leaping hurdles has always come pretty naturally to him but he’s also worked at it and made strides to finally break through and improve year by year.
The anxiety and adrenaline of competing against a talented field in front of a packed Howard Wood Field Saturday created the perfect storm for Schmeichel to put together his best race to date and claim his first state title.
Jonathan Fernandez covers high school and college sports for the Argus Leader. Contact him at jfernandez1@argusleader.com. Follow him on Twitter at@JFERN31
This article originally appeared on Sioux Falls Argus Leader: West Central junior Liam Schmeichel claims first state championship
