Davis Benson, please report to the awards podium.
Those words crackled out of stadium PA speakers for Moorpark High’s multi-event phenom too many times to count this spring.
It was just that kind of season for The Star’s 2026 Boys Track and Field Athlete of the Year.
The junior set program records in four events at Moorpark this season, won four Coastal Canyon League titles, including the long jump, the high jump, the 110-meter hurdles and the 4×100-meter relay, and made the podium in three different events at the state meet.
“The only word I can find to describe it is awe,” Benson said of his special year.
Benson won CIF-Southern Section Division 3 titles in the long jump and the 110-meter hurdles and was runner-up in the high jump. At the state meet, he was sixth in the long jump, eighth in the 110-meter hurdles and anchored the 4×100 to a seventh-place finish.
He finished his junior year tied for No. 4 all-time in Ventura County in the high hurdles in 14.03 seconds and tied for No. 8 all-time in the high jump with a clearance of 6 feet, 10 inches.
If you had told Benson at the start of the 2026 track season that the two-time state high jump qualifier would not contest the event at all at this year’s state track meet, he might have looked at you funny.
Plenty didn’t go according to plan this season for the Musketeers star.
An ankle injury kept Benson away from the high jump pit at the state meet and he largely dropped the 300-meter hurdles, an event he set the school record in this season, running 38.82 seconds, in order to compete on the Musketeers’ 4×100-meter relay.
“There were so many factors that changed throughout the season,” Benson said. “It’s wild to look back on.”
Joining the relay was a decision he would not regret.
Benson said the highlight of the season was anchoring the team to run 40.60 seconds at the CIF-SS Masters, setting a Ventura County record and qualifying for the state championship meet.
“I got to achieve something really great with my favorite people, my best friends,” Benson said. “That was the most amazing moment. … I hear Payton (Sustin) yelling from behind me, see Kade (Hunter) waiting at the finish line and Jalen (Aguilar-Carnes) is running down the field, screaming, when we see that 40.60 up. I just remember that moment so vividly.”
Racing against Servite, the fastest team in state history, the Musketeers handed the baton off to Benson on the anchor leg nearly even.
“Our guys knew they were going up against the best in the country,” Moorpark head track coach Christian Dearborn said. “They never backed down — that’s Davis.”
A swagger defines the junior’s attitude as an athlete, infecting those around him with confidence to attack their own goals, according to Dearborn.
“I have seen good sprinters, I have seen good jumpers over the years,” Dearborn said, “but when they have that confidence, that swagger about them, I have only seen that in a few athletes.”
Competing at a high level in so many events, Benson trained alongside many of the athletes who helped set 12 school records this outdoor season.
In the sprints, he tested Aguilar-Carnes, the 200-meter dash record-holder. At the high jump pit, he challenged Dean Guzman, a 7-0 jumper. On the runway, he swapped technique tips with one of the greatest girls long jumpers in county history in Gianna Gonzalez.
Benson said that as much as he helped push his teammates, their willingness to work raised him to even higher heights.
“Our sprint coach, Coach Phyllis, always says, ‘To be the best, you have got to train like you are No. 2,’ ” Benson said. “Dean (Guzman) came along, he jumped 6-7 at state the year before, then made 6-8, kept climbing, kept working. Every time someone at Moorpark puts in the work and sets a goal, I have seen it get hit.”
Benson’s impact on the program wasn’t just on his fellow athletes, it was on his coaches, too. Moorpark’s veteran staff had to learn a valuable lesson coaching him: how to share.
“You get a Davis every once in a lifetime as a coach,” Dearborn said. “Coach Imre (Santha) wants him to be the best high jumper. I want him to be the best long jumper. Our sprints coach wants him to be crucial on the relay. This year, as a staff, he taught us as many lessons, or more, than what we taught him.”
In key moments this spring, Benson came up clutch.
At the CIF-SS finals, he launched from sixth place into first to win a Division 3 title in the long jump on his final attempt. At state, he did the same thing, leaping from ninth to sixth with a big jump.
“I never saw Davis blink,” Dearborn said. “It doesn’t matter if it is his last jump (or) he hasn’t jumped well all day, he is going to go for it.”
Last fall, Benson proved himself a budding star on the gridiron while playing for Dearborn, making flashy, explosive plays on special teams and emerging as a big-play threat at receiver for the football team.
The sport taught the future decathlete lessons he has carried into the track season.
“Football taught me toughness,” Benson said. “You have got to get through a whole four quarters and that fourth quarter I will compare that to the 1,500 (meters). That 1,500 at the end of the decathlon is going to be really, really hard. It might suck a little bit. That fourth quarter of football, when you are down a touchdown, you have got to work really hard to get that ball down the field or make a big tackle. You have got to make that count in the hardest of times.”
Whether it’s for track or football, Benson is going to be chasing a scholarship right into his senior season. Don’t expect to see the multi-sport star resting on his laurels.
“It’s all gas next year,” Benson said. “I am going for it all, in everything.”
The Star’s All-County Boys Track and Field Second Team
Dominic Massimino is a staff writer for The Star. He can be reached at dominic.massimino@vcstar.com. For more coverage, follow @vcsdominic on Twitter and Instagram.
This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: Davis Benson is The Star’s Boys Track and Field Athlete of the Year
Reporting by Dominic Massimino, Ventura County Star / Ventura County Star
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Dominic Massimino, Ventura County Star | USA TODAY Network
