“You can’t change the ground you fight on, but you can change the tactics you fight with.”
That motto served Malcolm Burks during a 20-year military career and it served him in his capacity as coach of the Newburgh Elite Track Club, as the club has been training and competing since track and field – considered low- and moderate-risk sports by the New York State Dept. of Health were approved by Gov. Andrew Cuomo in early July.
So, when approval was granted, with the club needing to change its tactics, Burks did his homework.
“I looked to see what other programs were doing,” Burks said. “I looked at the bubble the NBA did, and what the NFL did. I looked at some other teams that were doing track clubs. Some places had soccer and cross-country clubs. I just took a little bit of what I saw and made it fit in our program.”
The first change was the number of kids participating in the club. The club normally serves about 60 students, and Burks cut down the roster to about 20 kids, taking juniors and seniors first, who need the activity for college recruiting, especially in the absence of junior spring track seasons.

“I felt it was important because juniors and seniors lost their outdoor season,” Burks said. “For colleges, it’s about what you’ve done.”
Burks said there are a lot of colleges that have last year’s seniors coming back because they lost their season, and some colleges aren’t recruiting as much because they don’t have the spots to fill.
The club practices according to its COVID plan, which involves athletes keeping their distance and doing temperature checks. Burks also said athletes and parents have been helpful by limiting out-of-state travel.
“They’re staying local, which has made it a lot easier,” Burks said.
With clearance to start training given in early July, that left athletes with about four months where they did nothing at all, and when the club got back together for the first time, they needed a lot of conditioning work.
Now, they’re having success, finding most of that success in the 400-meter dash and the club posted five runners in the New York State Top 10, according to athletic.net.
James Onwuka is ranked second, finishing the event in 49.69 at the Dec. 6 Armory Metro Eagles Invitational. Matthew Worrell is ranked fifth after posting a 50.45 at Armory Trials No. 4 on Nov. 22. Reily Mazzetti is ranked seventh after posting a 51.01 and John Fermpong, Jr. is ninth with a 51.18 and Armaury Rudd is 10th with a 51.21.
Onwuka is ranked seventh in the state in the 200-meter dash with a second-place 23.05 finish at the Armory Metro Eagles Invitational on Dec. 6. Onwuka is ranked third in the 300 meters with Mazzetti ranked ninth with times of 35.80 and 36.86 at the Armory Trials No. 3 on Nov. 8.
Matthew Haynes is ranked fourth in the state in the 600 meters, posting a time of 1:25.82 on Nov. 8 Mazzetti and Matthew Worrell posted best times at the Dec. 29 Marine Corps Holiday Classic to rank sixth and seventh, with respective times of 1:26.65 and 1:27.03.
Haynes is also ranked second in the 800 meters, posting a 1:58.78 on Nov. 22, while Leonard Diaz and John Abrams are ranked sixth and seventh with times of 2:05.69 and 2:06.25. Abrams is ranked fourth in the 1,000 meters posting a 2:44.39 on Nov. 8.
Andgeo Baidoos is ranked seventh in the long jump reaching 19-0.25 on Dec. 20 and Daniel Perez reached 18-6 on Dec.19 to be ranked ninth. They also are ranked eighth and ninth in the triple jump, reaching respective distances of 37-10.25 and 37-4.75.
On the women’s side, Marissa Foster is ranked second in the 55-meter dash, posting a 7.37 on Dec. 19 at the Energice Coaches Hall of Fame Invitational. She’s also ranked second in the 200 meters with a 26.45 on Nov. 22. She’s ranked fifth in the 300 meters with a time of 44.96.
Alyssa Worrell is ranked ninth in the 55-meter hurdles, posting a 10.19 on Dec. 6, and Alexis King is ranked fourth in the triple jump, reaching 33-3.25 on Dec. 29.
They’ve competed mostly at the Armory in New York City, and said it was a “win-win” once they got the clearance to compete.
“I had to do something within the guidelines to make sure I give these young men and women opportunities to get to the next level,” Burks said. “I think on the scale of 1-10, it’s been a 10, not only physically, but also psychologically. You have to have some kind of routine other than sitting home and playing Fortnite.”
The pandemic has also changed the way the club travels as each of the parents need to drive their athletes to the Armory, located in uptown Manhattan because the club can’t travel together in a bus.
“I just thank the parents who have been supportive,” he said. “Every time we go to the Armory, they have to drive their children. Sometimes we’re going in an eight-car convoy and then have to warm up outside. They’ve just been trusting the process.”