Junior Latesha Bigby is turning up her performance as she switches gears for the outdoor track and field season.

After a successful indoor track and field season for Bigby, NIU has switched to competing outdoors, but that hasn’t changed her results. In just three outdoor meets, the junior has qualified for the MAC outdoor conference meet in 100-meter hurdles and 400-meter hurdles.

“I’m in love with the hurdles in general,” Bigby said. “I like challenges, and I find hurdles as a challenge.”

Bigby has competed in every meet for the Huskies since being added to the roster.

During the indoor season, Bigby earned 10 top-five finishes at competitions in five events. One standout performance came when she set the NIU record and her personal best in the pentathlon when she finished fourth and scored 3,835 points at the MAC Championships Feb. 28.

The junior multi-event athlete made the jump to the university scene after two seasons at Butler Community College in El Dorado, Kan., where she was a NJCAA All-American in a respective indoor or outdoor event on 12 occasions. Bigby capped off her junior college career with a first-place finish at the 2013 NJCAA Indoor National Championships out of the 15 participants in the pentathlon when she totaled 3,686 points.

Butler shares the same conference as Neosho County Community College in Chanute, Kan., where first-year assistant coach Vince Bingham was the head track coach last season.

“… I got to watch her run when I was coaching at another junior college about an hour and a half a way,” Bingham said. “We were in the same conference, so when [I was] watching her compete, I thought she was a really good athlete. So when I had the opportunity to leave my community college and come here to NIU, trust me, she was the first one on my list to get ahold of, and she’s been performing well beyond expectations, better than we even thought she could be.”

Bingham said Bigby did not transfer over with the best technique in the hurdles. But with help from the coaching staff, one of Bingham’s first NIU recruits has made great strides and has a bright future.

“When she walked in, she was taking nine steps before she got to the first hurdle and everyone in the world takes eight,” Bingham said. “We kept seeing that, so we kept changing her and changing her. Now she doesn’t take eight steps; she takes eight really fast steps.

“Her [personal record] was like a 14.4 [in the 100-meter hurdles], and she ran a 13.75 last weekend, which puts her top 18 in the region … top 20 and 48 qualify for the regional meet, so she’s close to being safe. She’s on pace to break the school record.”

The student-athlete has also seen improvement in her ability. Bigby loves the record-breaking and near-record-breaking performances she has achieved, but she has her eyes set on making it to the NCAA Outdoor Championships in May.

“It’s a good feeling, to be honest. It’s been awesome,” Bigby said. “It makes me want to go to an even higher level [until] I reach my goals.”