Name: Elijah Pflipsen

School: Kaneland

Sport: Track and Field, senior

Why he was selected: Pflipsen won the shot put championship at the Illinois Top Times indoor state meet with a 16.21-meter throw for a personal record. As a team, Kaneland took home 13 medals at the meet.

Pflipsen caught up with Chronicle sports reporter Jacob Bartelson to discuss his achievements, season goals and more. Pflipsen was voted Athlete of the Week by readers.

Bartelson: In the week leading up, you didn’t have an overly strong showing prior to state. What happened?

Pflipsen: [At the Lake Michigan Invite] my first two throws, they all felt good distance-wise, but I fouled out of the front because I landed on the toe board for scratches. The third throw, I tried to play it super safe and get myself to the next round, but I played it way too safe and only got 41 feet. That’s when it got in my head. That carried over to the finals where everything just sort of fell apart that day, unfortunately.

Bartelson: What happened in the finals for the Lake Michigan Invite?

Pflipsen: I had two scratches and one that went 39 feet because it slipped out of my hand.

Bartelson: What were some of the things that you worked on during the week leading up to state to get some of those things corrected?

Pflipsen: One of the first things I did was I got new throwing shoes because the ones I had been using were a year old at that point. We also changed where I started on the back, so I was off-center. I always ended up pulling left at the end of a throw. We moved [my stance] to the right so I ended more center at the front. That’s helped me stay in the ring a lot easier.

Bartelson: You had the exact bounce back you were looking for with the personal record and championship. How satisfying was it to go from the performance the week before to a completely different result the following week?

Pflipsen: It was very exciting. I wasn’t expecting that much because I knew there were people throwing 16.8 meters as sophomores, which is insane to me. … That second-round throw [16.21 meters], that was all super awesome to me because it ended up putting me farther [program mark-wise] than one of my idols since freshman year [former Kaneland competitor Drew Hahn].