A freshman who was a late arrival on to campus due to Covid-19 travel restrictions, Burke has hit the ground running since he joined the Hillsdale College men's track and field team for the winter indoor season.
And Burke is already proving himself to be one of the fastest sprinters in the Great Midwest Athletic Conference. On Tuesday, the G-MAC office announced that the native of Bridgetown, Barbados had been named the conference's male track athlete of the week for his accomplishments over the weekend.
Competing at one of the biggest collegiate indoor meets in the Midwest, the Grand Valley State Big Meet, on Friday, Burke ran a career best time in the 400 meter dash of 48.80 to take fourth in a loaded field. That time was the second fastest 400 by a G-MAC athlete this season, and less than .4 of a second off the NCAA Division II provisional qualifying mark in that event.
Burke also has been a critical part of an extremely fast Charger 4x400 meter relay. Teaming with fellow freshman Sean Fagan and sophomores Benu Meintjes and Ian Calvert, Burke helped the Charger 4x400 take fourth at the Big Meet in a G-MAC record-setting time of 3:14.98, earning the first DII provisional mark for the relay this season. The Chargers' 4x400 time is the 14th-fastest in Division II currently, and more than five seconds faster than the next fastest time in the G-MAC this season.
Burke came to Hillsdale as a record-setting sprinter in Barbados, who represented his home country at the Carribean Union of Teachers Games, a junior track and field event attended by several Carribean countries on a yearly basis.
He and the Charger men compete again this Saturday at the Hillsdale Tune-up meet, looking to make their final preparations before the G-MAC Indoor Championship meet from Feb. 26-27 hosted by Cedarville University.
Photo by Gwendolyn Buchhop