Rodney Burkes enters his second season as an assistant coach for the Illinois State track and field program, specializing in sprints, hurdles and relays.
Burkes' hurdlers saw great success during the 2019-20 indoor campaign. The freshman duo of Brandon Ratliff and Jaden Johnson made great strides throughout the season with both finishing in the top-five at the Valley Indoor Championships. Ratliff, who has a personal-best time of 8.11 seconds, earned his first All-Valley honors with a third-place finish and currently sits fifth all-time on the ISU indoor top-10 list in the 60m hurdles. Johnson, who placed fifth with a personal-best time of 8.15 seconds at the Valley Championships, has the seventh-fastest time in ISU indoor track & field history.
Tori Ortiz has a breakout season under the guidance of Coach Burkes. The sophomore from Batavia earned All-Valley honors in three out of her four events. Ortiz, who competed in the 60m, 200m, 400m and the 4x400m relay earned All-MVC accolades in the 200m (third place), the 400m (second place) and the 4x400m relay (third place). She also scored points for the 'Birds in the 60m with a seventh-place finish. During the MVC Indoor Championships, Ortiz set personal bests in the 60m (7.61 seconds) and the 400m (55.75 seconds). Her 400m time was not only her first sub-56 time, but also moved her into the Illinois State track & field indoor top-10 with the seventh-fastest time.
Burkes also helped the women's 4x400-meter relay of Destiny White, Tori Ortiz, Whitney Ward and Hattie Plumb to All-Valley honors with a third-place finish with a combined time of 3:46.14.
In his first season with the Redbirds, Burkes coached Demetria Anderson (100mH) and Ben Montgomery (400m) to MVC titles and led the Illinois State sprints group to eight All-Valley individual performances.
Anderson, who already held the 100-meter hurdles school record prior to Burkes' arrival, broke the school record in the 60-meter hurdles in 2019 under Burkes' guidance. Additionally, Anderson qualified for the NCAA West Prelims in the 100mH for the third time in her career in 2019.
Burkes helped guide the men's and women's 4x400-meter relays to All-Valley honors at both the MVC Indoor and Outdoor Championships, including a MVC champion women's 4x400m relay at outdoors. The 4x100m relays each finished in the top-three at the 2019 MVC Outdoor Championships, making that six relays to earn All-Valley honors in Burkes' first season at ISU.
A USA Track and Field Level II certified coach, Burkes joined the Redbirds after spending a season as a volunteer assistant coach at Oklahoma State. During his time at Oklahoma State assisted with the men’s and women’s sprints and long sprints. He also assisted the staff with weight room conditioning, functional strength, active recovery and power development for the men’s and women’s sports programs as well as with on-campus recruiting. During his one season with the Cowboys, he helped play a key role in mentoring the school-record breaking women’s 4x400-meter relay team and the men’s and women’s regional qualifying relay squads.
Prior to his stint with the Cowboys, Burkes served as an assistant men’s and women’s track and field coach at Edmond Memorial High School from 2011-17. While there, he coached 57 state champions and helped the team win six state titles in seven years. He was a four-time Class 6A coach of the year and six-time conference coach of the year. At that same time, Burkes established the Flytime Track Club and coached 24 nationally-ranked athletes from 2012 to the present including Penn Relays champion John Teeters.
Burkes started his collegiate coaching career as an assistant at the College of DuPage in 2010-11, while also serving as a coach with the Aurora Flyers Track Club from 2004-12. As a student-athlete at Oklahoma City University, he was a member of the 4x400-meter relay team that qualified for the NAIA National Championships in 2009. He graduated from OCU in 2010 with a bachelor’s degree in exercise science.
