Warwick native and St. Ray’s standout runner Darius Kipyego added another honor to his already impressive resume, being named the 2019-20 Gatordae Player of the Year in indoor track.

As a junior, Kipyego set records in the 600-meter run as well as the 800 run. He also was ranked third in the country in the 600 as well as fifth in the 800 with times of 1:19.65 and 1:52.55, respectively.

“It feels awesome, I am blessed to be one of the many runners that have gotten it. It’s an honor to be named this, there were many great candidates, it’s an honor. To bring it back to the Saints, it feels awesome,” Kipeyego said.

Kipyego also won the 600 at the Rhode Island State Championships and also finished third in the 1,500. He later went on to take first place in the 600 at New Englands.

Kipyego was proud to hit his goals this past season, and has already began mapping out his plans for coming back stronger his senior year.

“It’s obviously nice to break a couple of records which is what we were aiming for. I know there is some unfinished business though, with internationals being taken away from us. I think they made the right decision, but with everything going on, we did a nice job of picking and choosing our races and doing what we did during the season. We sat down at the beginning of the season, figured out what our goals were, and we were able to accomplish those. I’ve got to just keep doing a little more, especially going into my senior year, I’m just going to keep having to step it up and take it to the next level,” Kipyego said.

Not only does Kipyego hope to repeat as a champion, he also hopes to improve his performance in other events and become more well-rounded moving forward.

“My bar is set very high and I expect to achieve those goals. I want to reach my goals, not even with just the 800, I want to have that range, from 400, 800, 1,000, maybe even 1,500. I want to have that strength, that speed, I’m going to set the bar high,” said Kipyego. “Especially seeing what happened this year, and knowing that I’ll have to take it to an even higher level my senior year, my goal is to get better with each time.”