GRESHAM —

Kohana Nakato was not supposed to be here.

The Summit sophomore began throwing the javelin only three months ago.

“I have her very first throw this year on video and when I look at that video there’s no way she should be here today, absolutely no way,” said Summit assistant coach Kevin Cornett on Friday after Nakato placed second in the javelin at the Class 6A track and field state championships at Mt. Hood Community College. “It defies logic how she’s here. It’s just a lot of hard work and she wanted to be here. She’s an overachiever and expects nothing less than the best.”

Nakato actually won her first competition in March at home in a dual meet against Bend High. But her winning throw of 106 feet, 5 inches was not close to what she would need to qualify for state.

“I had to work on everything,” said Nakato, who spent her freshman season sprinting and jumping. “I had no experience. I’ve improved a lot.”

By April, Nakato had progressed by 22 feet, winning the javelin with a throw of 128-9 at another dual meet at Summit. She then threw another personal best of 129-4 to place fifth at the Nike/Jesuit Twilight Relays in Portland earlier this month.

Continuing to PR, Nakato won the Bend City Championships with a throw of 135-10. To qualify for state, she placed first at the Mountain Valley Conference championships with a throw of 134-9.

“The javelin is one of the most technical events in track and field,” Cornett said, recounting Nakato’s progress. “We’ve put in a lot of work, every single day, a lot of upper-body work, a lot of footwork, a lot of form technique work.

“The javelin is really not as much of an arm event as people think. It’s bringing the entire body into the throw and transferring power from the legs into the jav and timing, all those things play a part into it. It’s repetition and muscle memory over and over. The javelin just takes off on its own, when it works.”

Nakato was the No. 2 seed entering the state meet but on Friday she had just the sixth-best throw after prelims.

Her best throws came in the finals, where she went 130-4 on her second throw and 133-11 on her final attempt.

“I added more power and more motion to it and it did what it was supposed to,” said Nakato of her final throws.

After placing second in the state, Nakato said she still has much room for improvement.

Her approach is shorter than many of her competitors, which makes it easier to get her timing down but does not allow her to generate as much speed on the runway.

“Everybody else had long approaches and would gain speed and I was the awkward one with a short approach,” said Nakato, who added that she will work on extending her approach by next season.

Nakato has already broken Summit’s sophomore javelin record, and Cornett sees her easily breaking the school record of 140 feet by the time she graduates.

“She has so much more that she needs to work on,” Cornett said. “We think that she is going to be over 150 feet in the next couple of years. She’ll easily win state.”

She was close this year: St. Mary’s Academy’s Isabelle Esler, also a sophomore, won the 6A title at 136-6, just over 2 1/2 feet farther than Nakato’s runner-up mark.

“She’ll be able to go to any college she wants and get a scholarship,” Cornett said of Nakato. “I’m excited for the next couple of years. She’s a very easy kid to coach. I love working with her every day.”

— Reporter: 541-383-0307, dwiley@bendbulletin.com