Wawasee senior Clayton Cook heads to a sectional title in the 110 hurdles Thursday night at Goshen.

GOSHEN – Clayton Cook said that nothing was hurting him Thursday night.

That was a bad thing for his competition in the Goshen Boys Track Sectional.

The Wawasee star put the hurt on his opponents in dominating fashion in collecting a pair of individual championships to lead the Warriors.

Cook, a state finalist in the 110-meter hurdles a year ago, dominated the event to repeat as sectional champion. He won in a time of  14.63, just slower than his seed time of 14.34, which is the top effort in the state coming into sectional action.

Cook also claimed the top spot in the 200-meter dash in a winning effort of  22.37. He was the top seed in that event at 22.05.

“I’m real happy with that race,” said Cook moments after winning the 200. “That was probably my best start of the year. I was ready to go in the blocks. I wanted the sectional record (21.80) so bad. I’ve been so close to it.

“I felt really good in the hurdles race. It was really clean. That might have been my cleanest race ever. Before that race I told myself to go out and prove it (regarding the fastest time in the state).

“I’m feeling great. Nothing hurts tonight. I’ve been icing and doctoring my shins the last couple of weeks. I’m satisfied tonight.”

Cook also had a little extra motivation working when he dug in for the finals of the 200. He had trouble with the baton exchange in the 4 X 100 relay as the anchor leg. Despite the handoff problem, the Warriors were second in the event in a time of 43.15, their second best time of the season. The team of Cook, JJ Gilmer, Tyler Courter and Cole VanLue were the top seed coming in at 43.07.

“Our goal was under 43 in the relay and we could have had it if not for my messing up the exchange,” said Cook. “We had been practicing it with my steps with my shins hurting and tonight they weren’t and I just took off too early. I had some anger and adrenaline for that 200 after that.”

JJ Gilmer makes his approach for the long jump.

Senior Gilmer earned a third-place finish in the high jump. The State Finalist from a year ago cleared 6-4 after going 6-5 in the sectional last year to place second. He finished behind Elkhart Central senior Treyton Harris and Northridge senior Brock Downey, as both cleared 6-6 with Downey taking the title and Harris placing second.

“The high jump was fun today,” said Gilmer. “I was expecting good competition. I thought that it would be me and Trey and there was the three of us. That was fun. I’m not disappointed at all. I get to jump with them again next week at the regional. I will fix the things I messed up on today.”

Gilmer also placed fourth in the long jump at 21-5 1/2 after coming in as the top seed with a leap of 22-4.

“I just was not feeling it in the long jump tonight,” Gilmer said. “My main focus was the high jump. We did great in the 4 X 100 too. That was fun. It was close and crazy. Our focus was moving on there and we did that.”

Senior Jonathan Walker of the Warriors will also advance to the South Bend St. Joseph Regional next Thursday. Walker placed third in the discus with a throw of 145-05.

“We wanted to see if Clayton could perform tonight with a shorter time between the hurdles and the 200,” said Wawasee coach Scott Lancaster. “The answer is yes. JJ had a great first attempt at 6-6 and just missed it. He will be there next week. Walker did a nice job in the discus for us and our 4 X 100 got out. I can’t be unhappy tonight. We had a lot of kids do a great job.”

Wawasee totaled 50 points to finish in seventh place in the final team standings.

Tyler Courter competes in the prelims of the 200 for the Warriors.