Spring Break Spotlight: Lee keeps hurdles legacy intact

Hearing the sentence ‘you just broke a record’ is something that very few people will hear in their lifetime.

Sandpoint High School junior Rusty Lee broke the school record in the 300 meter hurdles at the Bonners Ferry Invitational on Saturday, March 26, with a time of 39.73.

What’s even more rare than breaking a record? Doing it in something you had no intention of participating in.

Lee had no desire to run the 300 meter hurdles when he began his track career at Sandpoint High School. The stigma behind the event made him a little hesitant at first.

“People would say it was a terrible event,” Lee said. “They said that it hurts so bad after you finish the race. ”

Lee had a hurdling background. He ran the 110 meter hurdles since the beginning of his track career, but he never had any interest in adding the 300 to his list of events.

“Coach (Tom) Keener talked me into it my sophomore year,” Lee said. “Now it’s become one of my favorite events.”

After running the event just once, Lee figured out he was made for the event.

“I competed for the first time and figured out I could compete at state,” Lee said. “Now every time I run it I have so much fun.”

He said the 300 meter hurdles is an event that separates great athletes from those who are just there to be there.

Lee’s success can be narrowed down to focus and speed, but a lot of it comes from learning from his mistakes.

“You have to study your steps,” Lee said. “I watch professional hurdles to see their little habits when they're hurdling. I also watch a lot of videos of myself. I film myself when I’m hurdling.”

When training for his hurdling events, Lee trains in a very specific way. This is in order to make sure he’s in the best possible shape both physically and mentally.

“I still do all the sprint workouts with the sprint group,” Lee said. “I still run the relays that we do and when I’m practicing I’ll do normal block starts. Then I’ll do a block start and go over the first few hurdles. You have to stay late and come early.”

Last year was Lee’s first time competing in the 300 meter hurdles. He got very close to beating the record, but like anything in athletics, success doesn’t happen overnight. He had to make corrections.

“My second time running in the event, I fell over the first hurdle,” Lee said. “I had my steps wrong. I had to alternate my legs. I haven’t been able to do that and I fell.”

That moment stuck out to Lee. So much so that he spent the entire offseason making sure he could alternate his legs.

“I worked with my coaches and began to learn how to alternate legs,” Lee said. “I’ve been able to go off either leg and that helps in my embrace. Not having to worry about that really helped me this season.”

Lee took another sigh of relief due to the timing of his record breaking performance, breaking the record at his second meet of the season.

“I don’t have to worry about it anymore,” Lee said. “I don’t have to go out to a meet and worry about beating the record.”

Lee was in a pressure cooker of sorts when it came to breaking the school record, receiving pressure from different angles, including himself.

But he remained calm and managed to get what he wanted.

“It was something that I was thinking about,” he said. “There was pressure from my teammates and I wanted to break it personally, so I had a lot of pressure on myself.”

Lee is only in his junior year, so he’ll have a year and a half to extend his record.

“I want to get it under 39 seconds,” Lee said. “That’ll be good to see next year just to see how fast I can get. I want to set a good mark for that record and keep hurdling at Sandpoint competitive.”

During the winter season, Lee is leading Sandpoint’s boys basketball team.

Basketball was Lee’s first love in the sports world; in fact, basketball was when he found out he might excel in track.

“At the beginning of freshman year, I was keeping up with the seniors in the sprints,” Lee said. “That’s kind of when I figured out that I might be pretty fast.”

Lee is a standout on the court for the Bulldogs, earning all-league honors this year for the 4A Inland Empire League.

“When I was little I started playing soccer and stuff like that, but basketball is my sport,” Lee said. “I’m a huge fan. I like watching any basketball that’s on. Basketball was the first sport that made me want to play sports.”

For team goals this season, Lee noted that the Bulldogs’ are down in numbers a bit more than they usually are, but those that are on the team are performing really well.

“We are still doing very well,” Lee said. “We’re still competing at the state level, for the most part.”

As for Lee's individual goals, he just wants to stay competitive, especially in the more marquee events.

“I want to stay competitive,” Lee said. “We’re going to the Pasco Invite and I want to put up some good times so I can compete at the state level.”