Tahoma’s 4x100 relay team, Olympic-hopeful Princess Joy Griffey are fast company

Olivia Ribera and these three Wilson sisters already own the third-fastest 4x100 relay time in state history and they’ve only sprinted together for about a month.

But why does that not satisfy Princess Joy Griffey? She belted in laughter when asked what is left to work on.

“A lot more,” said Griffey, a first-year volunteer coach for the Tahoma High School track and field team. “Starting, finishing a race — especially finishing a race. All four of them.”

It’s not as if they’ve won three individual state titles like Griffey. The record-setting former Decatur sprinter is on the short list of some of the most elite girls track and field athletes in state history.

She still owns the state sophomore records in the 100 and 200, as well as the junior record in the 200 before an illness derailed her senior year. She graduated from Washington State University in 2010, where former coach Rick Sloan said she was the best female sprinter recruit the school’s had.

Now her afternoons are spent helping coach Tahoma’s track team alongside her former Decatur sprint coach, Aaron Blake, all while training for the Philippine Olympic National Team to compete in the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio. She was born in Bacolod City in the Philippines.

Griffey said she sees so much of herself in Tahoma’s rambunctious relay team.

Ribera is fairly fast herself — placing second in both the 100 and 200 at the 4A state track and field championships at Mount Tahoma last year as a sophomore.

Then junior Tierra “Umi” Wilson and freshmen twins Alisha “Miya” Wilson and Aliya “Nami” Wilson all moved to Maple Valley from Redmond before the school year.

“They bring so much energy,” Ribera said. “I’m just having so much more fun because it’s fun to run in a relay and be part of a team now.”

“It’s still like hard to believe. Everything just kind of came together this year.”

Most of the members of Tahoma’s track and field team call the Wilson sisters by their nicknames — which are Japanese. Their mother was born in Japan. (Tierra prefers her given name, while Miya and Nami have taken to the Japanese monikers.)

They combined with Ribera to run a 4x100 relay in 48.89 seconds in their first meet together. That was the best time in the state at the time.

Their third race together? They hit 47.13 seconds at the Pasco Invitational. Only two relay teams in state history have run faster — the 2014 4A state-title winning relay team from Federal Way (46.90) and the 1983 4A state-title team from Garfield (47.05).

“We knew they were going to be fast,” Blake said. “We just didn’t know how fast.”

“It was just a matter of them getting together and watching them hit some fast times,” Griffey said.

They first met snagging food samples at Costco. Ribera’s mother was apparently the instigator to the first conversation, though Tierra was sitting in the car (complicated story, she says).

Nonetheless, they said they became friends as rapidly as they run.

“If you ran track, you know Olivia,” Tierra said. “It was like ‘Oh, Olivia. I’m running with Olivia!’ It was a little intimidating at first, but she’s so nice when you get to know her.”

Nami said their speed doesn’t necessarily translate as well off the track.

“I’m like the laziest person in the world,” Nami said.

“I agree,” Miya quipped.

They finished practice one afternoon, and Blake had some old high school videos of Griffey awaiting them in a classroom. He wanted them to study her form, technique and drive.

“She’d be in last at the start of a relay and whoosh — she’s in first,” Tierra said.

Blake came to the program last season, helping Ribera improve from 16th in the 400 and 11th in the 200 at state as a freshman to second in the 100 and 200 last year. She reminded Blake so much of Griffey that he asked if she’d help coach the sprints and relays while she trains for the Summer Olympics.

“We were talking, and I said, ‘Hey, you are going to help me coach,’ ” Blake said. “That was basically it.”

Griffey said she was driving in her car a month ago when another rear-ended hers, which has caused a slight setback in her workouts. She said she’s hoping to qualify with the Philippine team, just like her mother before her, in the 400.

“Form, form, form — she’s saying that every day,” Nami said. “And to believe in yourself. She’s always telling you how good you are, even if you have a bad race.”

Who wins in a foot race, you ask?

“We just want to finish close to her,” Nami laughed. “One day.”

“I want to win, I always wanted to win — and I can see so much of that in them,” Griffey said.

Nami, Tierra and Ribera all have top-10 Class 4A times in the 100 as of Thursday. Ribera, Nami and Miya have top-10 times in the 200. Miya has the fifth-best long jump mark and eighth-best triple jump mark (did we mention she’s a freshman?). And they’ve combined for the best 4x100 and 4x200 relay times in the state — all classifications.

Combine them with Ginny Mehl in the throwing events — she owns the top shot put, discus and javelin marks in 4A this year — and there’s good reason to believe Tahoma should be competing for a 4A team title this year.

And if the team can help Griffey get to the Summer Olympics in Rio, so be it.

“She’s been a mentor,” Blake said. “It shows these kids that they can go out there and do a lot and accomplish a lot. It’s just about what they want to do and how bad they want it.”

This story was originally published April 21, 2016 at 8:20 PM with the headline "Tahoma’s 4x100 relay team, Olympic-hopeful Princess Joy Griffey are fast company."