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Quietly confident Chesterton senior hurdler Kieran Barnewall seeks to improve on third-place finish at 2024 state meet in 110 high hurdles and will try to score points for team in 300 hurdles later in the meet.

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Chesterton senior Kieran Barnewall, right, beats Merrillville’s John Peters to the finish line in the 110 hurdles at the DAC meet, May 15 at Lake Central. Barnewall is ranked third, Peters fourth on the performance list for the event at Friday’s state meet.

Tom Keegan
Onwardtrojans.com

Powering his long legs ever so gracefully over nine 39-inch hurdles stationed 10 yards apart, blurry-fast Kieran Branewall has not lost a 110-meter hurdles race all spring.
He hasn’t lost a 300-meter hurdles race either. And he has broken his own school records in both races this spring. Still, understand this: If Barnewall is going to win a state title, it will be in the shorter race. The 110 hurdles represents his best shot. He ranks third on the performance list heading into Friday’s state meet and ranks eighth in the 300 hurdles, based on the school record 38.75 he ran at the Valparaiso regional, where in the 110 race he ran a 14.00 and defeated rivals John Peters (14.13) of Merrillville and James Finley (14.44) of Andrean. Barnewall’s 14.00 places him third on the performance list.
“We’ve got some guys down in Indy, but I feel like I have a shot,” Barnewall said while walking to the team bus after the regional meet. “There haven’t been many races this season in the 110s where I’ve been behind, not event tonight, so I think I’ll have a push and hopefully I’ll have the race of my life.”
Nothing the race of his life will get him to the finish line first and he appears quietly confident that he will be at his best Friday at North Central High, where the state meet returns for the first time since 1997. Barnewall finished third in the 1110 hurdles last season on Indiana University’s track and just missed qualifying for the final as a sophomore, hitting a hurdle in the state preliminary.
He is not the favorite Friday. Rylan Hainje of Franklin Central has earned that distinction by breaking 14 seconds eight times this spring, including at regionals, where he ran a personal best 13.57. Evan Williams from Lawrence Central ran a personal record 13.69, his third sub-14 time this spring, to rank second on the performance list.
Barnewall’s school record in the 110 hurdles is 13.99. He also has run a 14.00 and a 14.01. Sprinters sometimes go faster when chasing someone and sometimes even gain speed just knowing who else is in the race. This will be the strongest field Barnewall has faced this season.
If he has anything left after running the 300 hurdles, he will be an option for the third leg of the Trojans’ 400x400 relay team, joining Aaron Resto, Cal Wisniewski and anchorman Louis Raffin. Nathan Vaughan, anchoring the 4x100 relay, running the 200 meters and doing the long jump, is another possibility, as is alternate Patrick Mochen.
“It’s a decision as we go,” Barnewall said of the third leg. “We talked about it as a team that we need to be honest with ourselves. We need to look inside and make the choice on if we can give our team the best shot, and we thought that Nate would give a better shot tonight and I think it paid off. Sometimes it takes some humility.”
Even with all the success the Trojans have had, humility doesn’t appear to have taken a hit. Undefeated in dual meets and the postseason, the Trojans won the DAC meet, the sectional and the regional.
If all falls into place for the Trojans, a top-five finish is a realistic goal. Barnewall is eager to contribute to that by scoring points in both hurdles races and either running in the 4x400 or rooting for teammates to score more points.

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