INDIAN TRAIL, N.C. - Twenty-eight hurdles. Seven water jumps. One state record.
Brooks Barbee ’27 took the name of Saturday’s Spring into the Season track meet quite literally, zipping through the quirky 2,000-meter steeplechase in 5 minutes, 54.78 seconds.
The previous North Carolina record for the event – typically only run a handful of times per year – belonged to Charlotte Ardrey Kell’s Patrick Gibbons (5:58.38) and had stood since 2022.
Brooks won Saturday’s race at Metrolina Christian Academy by just over 12 seconds. It was a sizable improvement over his previous personal best of 6:10.09, run in 2025.
The steeplechase is not sanctioned for most high school meets as few facilities have deep pits for the water jumps. Christ School’s previous best time in the event (6:06.71) belonged to Dawson Reeves ’24, who now runs for Duke University.