Maryland State Indoor Championships (4A/3A): Vannoy US #2 Shot, Bartholomew US top 10 800/500 double

A hot girls' 300 meter dash race at Prince George County's Sports & Learning Center in Landover for the Maryland State Indoor Championships with three girls breaking 40 seconds on a flat track in the 4A race with Wooton sophomore Olivia Ekpone (pictured left by Kevin Milsted of Mocorunning.com) as the winner at 39.20. Ekpone currently has the nation's fastest flat track time for 300 meters with 38.96 performance at the Montgomery County Championships on January 26th. In order to win the Maryland 4A 300 state title, Ekpone had to defeat one of the nation's fastest in Eleanor Roosevelt's Aurieyall Scott, who clocked a US #3 38.95 performance at Virginia Tech last month. Scott was second to Ekpone in the Maryland state meet at 39.64 and would later get redemption with a 7.07 clocking to win the 55 meter dash state title.

55 and 60 meter dash national leader Devon Smith of West Lake kicked off his state meet with an extremely close 35.42 victory in the 300 meter dash as it was a photo finish between Smith and Frederick's Brady Wilson also timed at 35.42 to take the margin of victory for Smith down to the thousandths of a second to determine Smith as the 3A state champion. Eleanor Roosevelt's Denison Long clocked a slightly faster time to win the 4A state title with a 35.24 performance. In the 55 meter dash finals, Devon Smith would break his own state meet record (6.39) from a year ago with a 6.37 clocking.

Foot Locker Nationals champion Solomon Haile was seriously challenged by Walt Whitman junior and NXN individual qualifier Andrew Palmer for the 4A 1600 state title. Palmer made a move with 300 to go, but Haile countered to pull away for a 4:18.74 victory and Palmer in second at 4:20. Haile came back in the 3200 meter run to win convincingly against Palmer in their second races of the day in a meet record time of 9:19.74.

Solid winning times in the 4x800 meter relay races as the Broadneck boys came close to a sub 8 performance with their 8:02.05 victory followed by Winston Churchill in second at 8:06.64.

A dominant run from Amirah Johnson of Eleanor Roosevelt in the 4A girls' 1600 meter race as the sophomore took the title by a 7 second margin of victory in 5:06.42 with most of the distance created between her and second in the final 400 meters of the race. Johnson scored a second state title on the day in the 800 meter run with a 2:18.66 victory.

Catonsville sophomore Xauddina Whittington had a stellar double in the sprints in the 3A girls' division as she followed up her 39.94 victory in the 300 earlier in the day with a meet record performance in the 500 meter dash in 1:15.24. She was pressed in the 500 by Western's Danielle Douglas (1:15.86), who also ran under the old 3A meet record. The fastest time of the day in the 500 belong to 4A winner and Eleanor Roosevelt junior Afia Charles as the US leader dipped just under 1:15 on a flat track in 1:14.99.

Charles later ran on the Eleanor Roosevelt 4x200 meter relay, which dominated the 4A race with the nation's fastest flat track time under 1:42 at 1:41.31. CH Flowers girls posted a solid time for second place at 1:43.48.

A great time was posted by Quince Orchard's Wayne Bartholomew in the 4A 800 meter finals as Palmer took the lead from Gaithersburg's Antonio Palmer in the final lap for a US #7 1:55.97 victory. Bartholomew completed a difficult double with two challenging middle distance events by also claiming the 4A 400 state title in a personal best and US #6 1:04.92.

Atholton High saw a 1-2 finish from their distance runners in the 3A boys 1600 and 3200 meter races with Graham Bazell (4:23.28) edging out teammate Christopher Wunsch (4:24.08) in the 1600, while Atholton senior Michael Lynch took the 3200 state title as well as the meet record in 9:25.53 with former state record holder Bazell in second at 9:39.61.

Emily Vannoy of Thomas Johnson destroyed her own state record by over 2 feet with a US #2 mark of 47'10.25" in the shot put to win the 4A state title by over 9 feet.

Maryland State Indoor Championships (4A/3A) Results

Below are the performances entered for the meet that met the national silver standard.

419 National Elites.