MacDonald Middle Schooler Cayla Hawkins is Already Breaking Records

MacDonald Middle School seventh-grader Cayla Hawkins has been running competitively since the age of 3 and doesn’t plan on slowing down anytime soon.

“The very first meet you ran in was Canusa in Flint,” Cayla’s mother, Candace Hawkins, said. “She was 3 years old, I have a picture of her with a little ribbon.”

Ten years later, Candace has a picture of Cayla holding up a medal after breaking the middle school 400-meter race Michigan record.

Cayla broke a 17-year-old record at the University of Michigan High School Invitational track meet on Jan. 21. 

“I felt like I was actually running slow when I was running,” Cayla said. “I felt like I didn’t go fast enough and didn’t even notice I broke the record.”

Finishing the race in 55.99 seconds, Cayla broke the previous record of 56.2 seconds held by Dynasty McGee, a Flint native. McGee went on to win 13 Michigan state titles and multiple national awards during her high school career before running track at Penn State University.

Currently, Cayla is ranked number one in the state for both middle school and high school in the 400-meter and ranked number two in the 200-meter. 

“My favorite part is seeing her when she crosses the finish line and she’s excited about what she just did,” Candace said. “When she runs, she just runs with ease. She looks so comfortable.”

Middle school student originally started running to keep up with her sisters.

Cayla started running to keep up with her older sisters, Comari and Ciya Hawkins. 

“I remember one time, we were on a hill, and Comari beat me up the hill and kept on making a case to me as I was going up the hill,” Cayla said. “That made me so mad.”

Throughout their childhood, the girls would compete in the Canusa Games, which is a partnership program through Hamilton, Canada and Flint, Michigan, in which athletes would stay with host families and participate in the competitions. 

Cayla fell in love with the running culture and started training with Track Life University at the age of 5.

“The running part is actually not my favorite, it’s the being around people,” Cayla said. “Being able to go to the meet and sit around and talk with the kids and being able to go to practice and have my friends there.”

Cayla runs both indoor and outdoor track for Track Life University and outdoor track for MacDonald Middle School. 

Cayla’s training involves a number of coaches locally and in Detroit.

Training and coaching Cayla takes a village. With her team being based in Detroit, it is sometimes difficult to get to practice right after school, especially during the indoor season. Therefore, her coach will send her the workouts and she will find a place to do them in East Lansing. 

“She’s got a lot of coaches,” Candace said. “It’s definitely a village, it takes a village.” 

In East Lansing, she has several people who help her, including Lansing Community College track and field coach Jameel Jones; East Lansing High School track and field coach Octavis Long; and her dad, Michigan State University (MSU) football wide receivers coach Courtney Hawkins. 

“Sometimes we can get into the football field, the indoor football field, and she can practice there sometimes,” Candace said. “Just to be able to run straight ahead is good.” 

Cayla also practices at the Michigan Athletic Club.

When her mom can drive her to Detroit, Cayla practices with the Track Life University team and coaches. 

Her current coaches there include Darnell Hall, Olympic gold medal winner in the 4×400, and Christopher Huff. 

Hall has been coaching track for 25 years and Cayla since she was 6. He said that a lot of her success is owed to the way she “pays attention to details.”

“Good family chemistry, raised with respect,” Hall said. “Pays attention to details. She loves to run.”

Cayla also said she owes a lot of her success to her youth coach, coach Kevin Greene (KG).

“He got me to where I am now,” Cayla said. 

Besides running, Cayla is also a straight-A student (her lowest grade was a 98% last semester), as well as a volleyball player for the middle school team. 

For the remainder of the indoor track season as well as the upcoming outdoor season, Cayla plans to continue to push herself and, hopefully, break some more records. But the young runner doesn’t plan on stopping there. 

“I want to make it to the Olympics when I get older,” Cayla said. 

Correction: This article was updated to correct the spelling of Comari Hawkins’ name.