Knights' Allen, Cougars' Trammel add to decorated legacies with titles on Day 2 of state track and field championships

LANDOVER — Ava Allen and Furious Trammel were never destined to be high school track and field stars.

Allen, a Middletown High senior, was intent on going to college to play soccer. Her only exposure to track and field was through middle school gym class until she got to high school and, on a whim, decided to go out for the team because she thought it would be fun.

Meanwhile, Trammel, a Catoctin High senior, wasn’t even thinking about running track and field until a former coach for the Cougars, Lois Strickland, watched him run up the steep hill next to the school’s football field in flip-flops because he had forgotten something after practice, and then suggested that he give the sport a try.

Yet, there Allen and Trammel were Wednesday at the Prince George’s Sports and Learning Complex on Day 2 of the state meet, featuring Class 2A and 1A schools, both decorated, multi-time state champions and still adding to their legacies.

Allen, a national pole vault champion, won the 2A girls pole vault for a sixth time, counting her three indoor titles in the event, with a height of 12 feet. It was well below her own state record for all classifications (12 feet, 7 inches, set last spring at this very place).

But it was still a win — her 10th state title overall spanning all of her events — and an accomplishment worth celebrating in her mind and the mind of her coach, Will Bell.

“I think it was a good day,” Bell said. “We didn’t get the heights that we want. But states is about winning more than anything else, and we already have the meet record.”

Allen also ran her personal-best time in the 100-meter hurdle preliminaries (14.64 seconds), an event in which she is one of the favorites to win Thursday, and finished third in the triple jump, an event she has won twice previously, with a mark that matched her season best (34 feet, 11 inches).

“For this year, I could not have done any better,” said Allen, who will run the hurdle final and long jump Thursday to cap her high school career. “I am happy. ... My goal is always to place in the top three of my events.”

Trammel, meanwhile, set a state record in the 1A boys long jump with his trademark flourish.

“Well, in typical Furious fashion, he said he was going to do it on his first jump,” Catoctin coach Dave Lillard said, alluding to Trammel’s confidence and knack for showmanship.

Trammel has a full meet schedule. He has the 400-meter dash, triple jump and 4x400 relay on Thursday. And his back has been bothering him all week after he tweaked it while triple-jumping in practice.

But the long jump was his only event Wednesday, which meant he had a chance to really let it rip from an energy conservation standpoint.

So, he did his normal warmup routine for his final jump before he had even started the event, and then got the crowd clapping for him as he prepared to take off down the runway.

Trammel hit the board and then flew 23 feet, 9¾ inches, almost a foot further than the previous 1A record that wasn’t wind aided (23-1½) and the top mark in Maryland this season.

“I thought I was going to jump out of the pit based on how close I landed to the ledge,” he said.

It was the only jump he would attempt in the event, confident that none of the other competitors would challenge the mark. And no one did. Aydan Downie of Colonel Richardson finished second with a jump of 22 feet, 4½ inches.

“I was going to give it everything I had,” Trammel said. “Putting it all on the line now [for the long jump] was going to help me conserve energy for the rest of the meet.”

The plan worked to perfection. Trammel jumped one time and was done for the day. And he successfully defended his long jump title, set a state record and picked up his seventh state title overall in the process.

He will attempt to defend his championships in the 400 dash and triple jump Thursday and help the Cougars win the 4x100 relay.

“I am ecstatic,” Trammel said.

Other top Frederick County finishers in Wednesday’s meet included Middletown’s Nanjo Levec, who finished second in the 2A boys high jump after clearing 6 feet, 4 inches on his second attempt of a jump-off with eventual champion Tim Kolawole of C. Milton Wright; the Brunswick girls’ 4x200 relay team, which finished second to Smithsburg in the 1A race by a thousandth of a second upon video review; as well as Catoctin’s Gabriel Riling (second in the 1A 3,200), Deacon McIlvaine (second in the 1A shot put) and the 4x800 relay team, which finished second in 1A.

Track and field has carried Allen and Trammel to heights and created life paths for them that they never would have imagined.

Allen will whittle her many athletic pursuits down to track and field at Clemson University later this year.

“It’s crazy,” she said of exclusively focusing on that sport.

Trammel is currently undecided on his college, but he is confident he will wind up with a major college program, even if it’s not right out of high school.

“I have had a lot of teachers come up to me and tell me I am a success story,” said Trammel, who grew up in poverty. “But I feel I haven’t reached my pinnacle yet. There are still chapters to write in my story.”