IF HE DIDN’T CATCH YOUR ATTENTION when he won a sprint double with HSR times (6.57/20.48) at the New Balance Indoor Nationals, maybe Issam Asinga has it now. The senior at Florida’s Montverde Academy has continued on fire since action moved outdoors.
First came a 10.06w/20.57 double at the Florida State Relays. Six days later, he won at the Florida Relays in 10.10 (wind 1.0). Then he moved up to race against pros and collegians at the Hurricane Alumni Invitational, placing 2nd in the 100 with his 10.15 and coming back with a big 200 win in 20.11.
That furlong mark makes him No. 2 all-time behind the 20.09 HSR of one Noah Lyles. At 100, his 10.10 has him at No. 5. And the season, as they say, is quite young.
That Asinga would make a splash in the sport is perhaps not a surprise if his last name rings a bell in your noggin. His father, Tommy, was runner-up in the ’92 NCAA 800 for Eastern Michigan. A 1:46.74 performer, he competed in the ’88, ’92 and ’96 Olympics for Suriname. His mother, Ngozi Mwanamwambwa, twice sprinted in the Games for Zambia, and won the ’92 NCAA Div. III 200 for Principia.
The younger Asinga says he’s always been more inclined to the shorter races: “I think as a kid you always want to pick the shortest stuff. The 100 and 200. The events are fast; everybody wants to come and watch those. I wanted that. I kind of manifested that for myself and I was like, ‘I’m gonna do this sprint.’ You know? I feel it. It’s fun for me and I was able to make it work for myself.”
He started in age group track for the Jackrabbit Club when the family lived in Atlanta. Then when he was in second grade, the family moved to Zambia for about four years: “I was just playing soccer; I was doing all types of different sports there, but track wasn’t really that big over in Zambia.”
In ’17, the family moved back to the U.S. to live in the St. Louis area. “That’s when I started to get back into track a little bit,” he says. “Nothing too crazy… I’m not gonna lie, I was just running it because it was a sports credit in the spring.”
He missed the ’20 COVID year, then, he recounts, “Sophomore year is when things picked up.” He was competing for Principia High in St. Louis, and he shocked many with his Class 2 State Meet performance.
Coming in with PRs of 11.18, 22.98 and 50.52,…
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