MASTER HURDLERS: County’s Best Share Common Goal of Qualifying

Except for a love of leaping on the run, the six best high school hurdlers in Orange County this season are as different as the strengths and strategies that guide them.

Meet Anthony Hale of Garden Grove, George Lynch of Mater Dei, Marc Kallick of Marina, Danielle Reaves and Emily Thiebaud of Esperanza and Suzanne Kerho of Mission Viejo.

All six will compete in the Southern Section Masters track and field championships tonight at Cerritos College in Norwalk.

All six have different motivations and styles, but one common goal: to finish in the top five of their event.

Those who do will qualify for the state championships, June 3-4 at Cerritos College.

The chance of qualifying looks best for Hale; he has the second-fastest time among the entrants in his event, the boys’ 300-meter hurdles.

Last Saturday, Hale, a senior, won the Southern Section 3-A title in 38.13 seconds. He did so by outrunning Lynch, the runner-up in 38.77.

Pasadena’s Kevin Dallas, who won the 4-A title, is the 300-meter hurdle leader at 37.84

“Last season, in (Southern Section) competition, I was kind of scared,” Hale said. “I didn’t do that well (finishing sixth in the Southern Section 3-A finals). But this year, I’m not scared at all. I’m going for it.”

Hale, at 5-feet 7-inches and 128 pounds, looks more like a distance runner than a hurdler. Funny thing is, Hale is a distance runner. In cross-country last fall, he was undefeated in Garden Grove League competition.

“As a sophomore, Anthony was a one- and two-miler,” Mike Mariola, Garden Grove coach, said. “One day I noticed him messing around on the hurdles. He was just joking around, but you could tell he had some ability. So I said, ‘Hey, let’s give it a try.’ ”

Two weeks later, Hale set a freshman-sophomore Garden Grove League record in the 330-yard hurdles (42.9) at the league finals.

“Now that I look back, I think, God, who’d ever think I would be a hurdler,” Hale said. “I guess I’m a real surprise.”

This season, Hale, who won the 400 meters and 800 meters and the 300-meter hurdles at the league finals, worked with the distance runners four days a week, and the other day was reserved for hurdle training.

Hale, who plans to run the steeplechase for Rancho Santiago College next year, believes the distance training has given him an edge.

“I look at a lot of guys and they always seem to lose their form toward the end of the race,” Hale said. “My problem is that I don’t even get going until the fourth or so hurdle.”

Mater Dei’s Lynch has just the opposite problem.

Lynch, the only county athlete to qualify in both the 110-meter and 300-meter hurdles, has a sensational start, as seen last Saturday in his 3-A victory in the 110 (14.66).

But he is commonly plagued by a mid-race lull, especially in the 300.

“I’ve lost most of my (300-meter) races on the fifth hurdle,” Lynch said. “Guys just fly by me there.”

Part of the problem is that Lynch has trouble alternating legs--switching his hurdle leg from right to left on the third, fifth, seventh and sometimes eighth hurdle.

Alternating legs often keeps athletes from stutter-stepping between hurdles. Less stutter results in smoother, faster races.

“We worked on it all (this past) week,” Mater Dei Coach Karen Frank said. “It’s fixed.” Lynch, who plans to play football and run track at UCLA next season, will need an edge tonight as he has the sixth-fastest time in the 110 (14.66) and the seventh-fastest in the 300 (38.77).

“My goal is to break 38 seconds in the 300s,” Lynch said, “and to run 14.3 in the 110s.”

Kallick already has run a 14.3, although some may argue that because it was hand-timed and run at a Marina home dual meet, it might not be valid. Marina Coach Dave Okura disagreed.

“We’re pretty good about getting accurate marks around here,” Okura said.

Kallick, at 6-3 and 200 pounds, is an imposing figure. As a freshman, he competed in the 110 hurdles, long jump and triple jump.

Kallick plans to attend San Diego State next year and hopes to compete in the decathlon.

Tonight, Kallick, the 4-A runner-up at 14.54, is the third-fastest entrant behind Arroyo Grande’s William Henry (14.11) and Pasadena’s Dallas (14.46).

Like Hale, Kallick’s strength is in the race’s second half.

“I usually get beat out of the blocks,” he said. “Though I’ve improved that a lot in the last two weeks.”

Improvement has definitely been the theme in the careers of Esperanza’s Reaves and Thiebaud.

Reaves, the third-fastest entrant in the 300 at 44.42, won the 3-A 100-meter hurdles title last Saturday but did not qualify for the Masters meet in that event. Her time of 14.77--a personal best despite crashing her leg into the final hurdle--was the day’s 10th-fastest, and only the top 9 qualified.

Thiebaud has the eighth-fastest time (44.74) in the 300. Cindy Byrne of Canyon Country Canyon is the event leader at 43.47.

Reaves, who began running the hurdles last year after she grew bored with the 200-meter and 400-meter dashes, has good technique but said she has a tendency to lose concentration and stutter-step on the last two hurdles.

Thiebaud, who has been hurdling since her freshman year, has excellent technique but lacks overall strength.

“Emily has just come into her own this year,” Al Britt, Esperanza coach, said. “Two years ago, you’d never have heard about these two girls. But because they’ve put in a lot of time and never gave up, they’ve been successful.”

Success runs in the Kerho family. Suzanne’s brother, Steve, still holds the Orange County record in the 110 hurdles at 13.41, clocked in 1982. Steve Kerho, who finished a successful four years at UCLA last year, will compete in the Pepsi Invitational at UCLA June 5.

Kerho, a junior at Mission Viejo, began hurdling at age 10 with the Mission Viejo-based Time Machine track club. Her motivation this season, she said, was to break into the 14-second range. She accomplished that last Saturday as she placed fourth in the 4-A 100-meter hurdles in 14.41.

Kerho is the fifth-fastest entrant in tonight’s race. Santa Monica’s Felice Lipscomb leads at 14.00.

“I’ve been doing the 100s for four years now,” Kerho, 16, said. “I’ve been waiting and waiting for my times to drop. Tonight, I just want to see how low I can take it.”