Performance: Waverly's Keshaun Harris
May 24, 2019
Keshaun Harris
Lansing Waverly senior – Track & Field
The reigning Lower Peninsula Division 1 champion in the 300-meter hurdles, Harris put himself in position to challenge for multiple titles at next weekend’s MHSAA Finals with wins in both the 300 (38.71 seconds) and 110 (14.23) at last week’s Regional at East Lansing, earning him the Michigan Army National Guard “Performance of the Week.”
Harris’ winning 300 time was his season best, as was his 14.14 prelim time in the 110. Also an all-league football player during the fall and starting guard in basketball, Harris is among the state’s elite on the track and undefeated in both hurdles races this spring despite getting a slow start after hurting his right ankle in his final basketball game this winter. As noted, he won the LPD1 title in the 300 last season in a personal-record 37.81 seconds and just missed the double finishing seventh hundredths of a second behind East Kentwood’s Job Mayhue in the 110. Harris also finished second in the 110 and third in the 300 at the LPD2 Finals as a sophomore, and qualified for the LPD2 Finals in both races as a freshman, earning seventh place in the 110.
The 37.81 at last year’s Finals and the 14 flat he ran in the 110 at the 2018 Regional are Waverly school records – which says a lot as the Warriors have produced a number of state contenders over coach David Pike’s 29 seasons leading one of mid-Michigan’s strongest programs. Harris will announce next week where he’ll continue his academic and athletic careers at the collegiate level – he has Division I and II opportunities – and will bring both first-class hurdling skills and a 3.6 GPA with aspirations of studying kinesiology and becoming an athletic trainer.
Coach David Pike said: “Keshaun’s success in the hurdles is due to his focus on getting better every day. He’s always the last one off the track, taking time each day to get the repetitions he needs to become fluent with each motion. The quickness and fluidity of his hurdling action come from years of focused practice. That’s not to say he’s hurdling 365 days a year. In fact, much of his success in track and field comes from his involvement in other sports. Football has helped him develop the strength and toughness needed to run through hurdle contact. Basketball with all of its jumping and rapid changes of direction has helped him become a more explosive and kinesthetically aware athlete. In the end, the bottom line is that Keshaun’s dedication to daily incremental improvement as an athlete has put him in position to compete for the state title in both the high and 300 hurdles.”
Performance Point: “Nobody really knew this but my coach, but I was sick,” Harris said in recalling the Regional. “I was pushing through it, so I just went out there and ran my best races of the season. I was dealing with the flu. .... Before the race I had to hydrate a lot. My body was a little weak. I had to make sure I got my body moving, got in a good warm-up, stayed loose and warm. I just went out there and gave it everything I’ve got and ran my best.”
Remembering runner-up: “(Last year’s 110 Final) has been in the back of my mind since it happened last year. My goal is still to be the state champion in both the 110 and 300. That’s been the goal since I came to Waverly, since I’ve been a freshman. That’s always been the goal, and always been a motivation too. … Last year I wasn’t as good with my form as I am this year. So this year as I go into this last week, I’m just working on form, getting over hurdles and getting back down quick and keeping everything tight.”
Multi-sport mechanics: “I think (all my sports) work together, because I’m always active doing something. Even in the winter or the summer, I’m always doing something. When track season comes around, I’m already in shape, and I’m already feeling good and strong. (Track has) made me even faster on the court or the field. I’m very elusive. I’m very flexible. So it’s helped me in a lot of areas.”
Looking up, looking ahead: “Aries Merritt, he’s an Olympic champion, and Grant Holloway goes to Florida and he’s another guy I look up to. I also look up to guys I ran against – Kentre Patterson (East Lansing), Noah Caudy (Lake Odessa Lakewood), even Job Mayhue who beat me last year. I still look up to all those guys, figure out what they’re doing and how I can input it into my hurdling. In track, you run against these guys so much. Once they’re gone, you’ve built a relationship with them, so it’s cool.”
Staying in sports: “I just like working with athletes and just being around sports, so I think (trainer) would be the perfect job to do. Actually, at the start of this season I had an ankle injury, I sprained it during my last basketball game, and that had me out for a month. As I worked with the athletic trainer at my school, I developed a love for wanting to become an athletic trainer and wanting to study kinesiology.”
- Geoff Kimmerly, Second Half editor
Every week during the 2018-19 school year, Second Half and the Michigan Army National Guard recognizes a “Performance of the Week" from among the MHSAA's 750 member high schools.
The Michigan Army National Guard provides trained and ready forces in support of the National Military Strategy, and responds as needed to state, local, and regional emergencies to ensure peace, order, and public safety. The Guard adds value to our communities through continuous interaction. National Guard soldiers are part of the local community. Guardsmen typically train one weekend per month and two weeks in the summer. This training maintains readiness when needed, be it either to defend our nation's freedom or protect lives and property of Michigan citizens during a local natural disaster.
Past 2018-19 honorees
May 16: Gabbie Sherman, Millington softball - Read
May 9: Nathan Taylor, Muskegon Mona Shores golf - Read
May 2: Ally Gaunt, New Baltimore Anchor Bay soccer - Read
April 25: Kali Heivilin, Three Rivers softball - Read
March 28: Rickea Jackson, Detroit Edison basketball - Read
March 21: Noah Wiswary, Hudsonville Unity Christian basketball - Read
March 14: Cam Peel, Spring Lake swimming - Read
March 7: Jordan Hamdan, Hudson wrestling - Read
February 28: Kevon Davenport, Detroit Catholic Central wrestling - Read
February 21: Reagan Olli, Gaylord skiing - Read
February 14: Jake Stevenson, Traverse City Bay Reps hockey - Read
February 7: Molly Davis, Midland Dow basketball - Read
January 31: Chris DeRocher, Alpena basketball - Read
January 24: Imari Blond, Flint Kearsley bowling - Read
January 17: William Dunn, Quincy basketball - Read
November 29: Dequan Finn, Detroit Martin Luther King football - Read
November 22: Paige Briggs, Lake Orion volleyball - Read
November 15: Hunter Nowak, Morrice football - Read
November 8: Jon Dougherty, Detroit Country Day soccer - Read
November 1: Jordan Stump, Camden-Frontier volleyball - Read
October 25: Danielle Staskowski, Pontiac Notre Dame Prep golf - Read
October 18: Adam Bruce, Gladstone cross country - Read
October 11: Ericka VanderLende, Rockford cross country - Read
October 4: Kobe Clark, Schoolcraft football - Read
September 27: Jonathan Kliewer, Grand Rapids Forest Hills Northern soccer - Read
September 20: Kiera Lasky, Bronson volleyball - Read
September 13: Judy Rector, Hanover-Horton cross country - Read
PHOTOS: (Top) Lansing Waverly's Keshaun Harris charges toward the finish during last season's Lower Peninsula Division 1 Final in the 300 hurdles. (Middle) Harris clears a hurdle during the 110 championship race in 2018. (Click to see more from RunMichigan.com.)
Zingsheim's Story an Award-Winner
May 31, 2012
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
Zack Zingsheim’s career highlight is an easy pick.
It was just a few months ago, at Michigan International Speedway, when he stunned even himself by winning the MHSAA Division 3 cross country championship.
He can describe in vivid detail being the last to come out of the chute at the finish, looking into the grandstand and telling himself to always remember the moment. He can see again his teammates further down the chute, chanting his name. The goose bumps he felt. How they jumped the fence, lifted him to their shoulders and carried him off the course.
It was the greatest day he could remember. And it ended with a pie in the face.
“I remember how surreal the moment was,” he said. “Since I was a little kid, I thought it would be so cool to win the state meet for cross country; the atmosphere is so amazing.”
Nearly as amazing is he doesn’t remember the flavor of the pie.
Zingsheim tells a story with the best of them – thanks in part to a keen photographic memory and attention to detail.
But he gets a Second Half High 5 this week because of his status as one of the state’s top high school runners – and what a tale he’s spun over the last year.
Zingsheim has the top-seeded Division 3 time in the 800 meters (1:55.30) heading into Saturday’s Finals at Comstock High School, and also runs on the top-seeded 800, 1,600 and 3,200 relays. He and his teammates won the 800 relay at last season’s Finals, and he has or is part of school records in all four of those races, plus the 400. He’s also the fastest in Cougars cross country history.
Another of his favorite stories to tell explains why.
Diamond in the rough
He remembers seeing the Corunna baseball diamond in the distance. That’s key to this story.
Zingsheim was a freshman in 2009, running the second leg of the 800 relay, and had just taken the baton. His right hip had been feeling tight and then painful over the previous couple of weeks, but he felt great at that point as he glanced ahead and saw the baseball field.
The next step, he felt like he got hit with a baseball square in the right hip. But there was no baseball.
He tried to bring the leg forward, and couldn’t. He dragged his leg the next 100 meters to complete his handoff, and then collapsed.
Zingsheim did see a “flabby piece of bone just laying there.” He started crying. His parents immediately drove him to the hospital as he screamed the lyrics to whatever was on the radio to try to forget the pain. (And yes, he remembered one off the songs: “Boom Boom Pow” by the Black Eyed Peas.)
The flexor muscle that connected his hamstring to his pelvis had torn and taken the top of that part of his pelvic bone with it.
Next came months of therapy and changes. He’d started on the freshman basketball team, but decided to stop that sport and focus on running. Still, he couldn’t get in shape that summer because he couldn’t put in the miles, and his sophomore cross country season wasn’t what he’d wanted – until he ran a personal best late in the season and got a needed confidence boost.
“There’s something so special about being able to run so hard and seeing hard work come to fruition on the course or the track,” Zingsheim said. “And especially, seeing how far I had to come. I wanted to see what kind of runner I could become if I put all that work in.”
His 1,600 relay finished eighth at the 2010 Division 3 Finals, another turning point. A year later, Lansing Catholic coach Tim Simpson needed a fill-in on the 800 relay. The date was April 13, 2011 – a day shy of two years since he’d suffered the pelvic break. “I’ve never been so nervous for another race,” he said. But the Cougars set a school record, and he’s been on that relay since.
A long road traveled
“He’s come a long way, but he’s always had that ability,” Simpson said. “He ran 50-70 miles a week during the summer. He reads about the top runners, follows it, so he know what they’re doing, what you’re supposed to do if you’re going to be good.”
There’s always an eye on the details; Zingsheim’s got a reputation among his classmates as the guy who always is last to turn in his tests. He gets done quickly, but spends the rest of the period double and triple-checking his answers to make sure everything is right.
There are plenty of other stories, of course. Like how he and his talented classmates – Lansing Catholic’s senior boys also played in the Division 5 Football Final in the fall – split up during middle school into football teams that stayed the same for months and turned into fierce rivalries. (He played receiver.)
He’s earned the story-teller role in his family too; at gatherings he’s often the go-to guy for a “quirky” or “goofy” family tale.
But the stories he’ll be most proud to be part of are those that get passed down to Lansing Catholic runners after him.
Zingsheim was in first grade when his brother Brandon was a senior on the cross country and track teams and began the Cougars’ tradition of saying a “Hail Mary” and chanting “Hey Cougars, what we going to do?” Zack is among those who now lead that rally.
Lansing Catholic had outstanding runners before Zingsheim. But with him and a strong group of individuals including distance seniors Jimmy Hicks (who will walk-on at the University of Georgia), Austin Winter and Joe Marrah, they could cap their careers with the team’s first MHSAA championship.
“What I really wanted to do by the time my tenure was done was lay a foundation. Build the program; do things the right way,” Zingsheim said. “I wanted to teach guys what it means to be an LCC runner.
“The last four years, we’ve really been able to build that program. … And I’m so excited to see where the program is going the next couple of years.”
Click to read more about Zingsheim's inspirations and aspirations.
PHOTO: Lansing Catholic's Zack Zingsheim was part of the championship-winning 800 relay at last season's Division 3 Final.