Freshman Dominic Wyant's College Debut is Impressive, 3 Personal Bests in 3 races highlighted by a :21.68 in the 200 meters

The Cardinal T&F team traveled to Howard Community College looking to continue its upward trend of achieving individual personal bests.  Since the outdoor T&F season started in March, every athlete on the team has achieved a personal best in their performances in more than one event. Needless to say, the team's training plan has been very successful and highly fruitful.

 

The team's first meet at the Univ. of Richmond was important to get a baseline reading of each athlete's fitness level. Head Coach Mark Pryor began to navigate the team's training plan based on where each athlete's performance level was as well as the team's mental attitude. In high school, sports are often dictated by what grade and level the students are in. In college, there is no distinction. No matter the age or grade level, college athletics is all encompassing.  Thus, athletes need to be more diligent in their preparation. This point has been stressed to the team since the beginning of team training in August.

 

Dominic Wyant started his college career with CCBC Catonsville in August. During those first 3 months of training, Wyant led many of the workouts and was noted in his giving maximum effort. It was during those early Fall months that Coach Pryor noted he saw an inner drive in Wyant to achieve a high level of performance. When the team's strength and conditioning program in the weight room began, it was Wyant who again showed diligence in making sure the weight training was done as prescribed. In November, Coach Pryor used a Time trial to see the benefits of the team's base training. It was Wyant's performance in the 300-meter trial that let the coaching staff know good things were on the horizon.

 

The JUCO Mid-Atlantic Invitational in April gave the CCBC Catonsville track athletes the opportunity to test themselves against other junior college athletes from schools in PA, Va, MD and Mass. On the first day of competition, there were preliminary rounds of the sprint events (100m, 200, 110m hurdles, and 100m hurdles). This is key because it gave those athletes who qualified for the final, a day/night's rest before the final helping to produce better results.

 

In the 200-meter prelims, Dominic Wyant ran :22.13 seconds in his first ever college race and improved his personal best of :22.25 from high school. On the second day of competition, Coach Pryor's instructions were simple to his team........he wanted his athletes to "COMPETE".  He asked each athlete to go out and run to win and not be worried about their time. As the gun went off for the men's 200m final, Dominic Wyant exploded out of the blocks in lane 6. His start was swift, and he ran the curve smartly. Entering the straightaway, Wyant began to exhibit his newfound strength, starting to move by other competitors in the lanes beside him. Standing tall and driving his arms toward the finish line, Wyant leaned thrusting his chest forward to finish in 3^rd place.

 

In the final results, Wyant had run an impressive personal best of :21.68. Such an improvement in only his first college race was unexpected but not surprising. Before the 200m final, Dominic competed in the 400-meter dash and again ran an excellent race to place first in his heat with a time of :51.31 which also improved his personal best from :53.76.  So, in all, Dominic ran three races and produced three PBs. Not a bad day for someone's first ever experience.

 

Coach Pryor was very pleased with his young sprinter's performance as the Junior College National Championship qualifying standard in the 200-meter event is :21.28 secs. That means Dominic is but .04 away from qualifying to compete against the best junior college sprinters in the country. Again, what a college debut.

 

Here is a link to the final results of the Mid-Atlantic T&F JUCO Invitational:  TFRRS | 2026 Mid Atlantic Track and Field JUCO Invitational - Meet Results

 

Fellow freshman Ohene Obiri Yeboah ran another inspiring race in the men's 1500 meters, placing 3rd and improving his personal bests by :11 secs from 4:29.69 to 4:18.55. Ohene also placed 2^nd in the men's 800-meter run in a solo effort from the slow section due to a clerical error in seeding.

 

Dominic Wyant and his teammates will have three excellent opportunities to compete against NCAA Division-I schools and achieve the NJCAA Championship standards at: