Dillon Mitchell has won a lot of races this spring. The Sheldon C.E. King sophomore recorded a 9.88 100-meter dash, the third-fastest all-conditions time in US high school history. Then he set the Under-18 world record in the 60-meter sprint, running 6.61 in the US Indoor Track and Field Championships. 

But the biggest race Dillon has won, without question, was the foot race against his older brother last summer. 

Will Mitchell II, a safety at Texas State, was home for the break. No sooner had he dropped off his duffel bag in his room than Dillon was challenging him to go to the track. Will is only four years older than Dillon, but Dillon says Will was the one he looked up to more than any adult; at least when his father isn’t around to get offended. You’d think that admiration came from Will winning a Class 5A State Championship in the 100-meter dash at Fort Bend Marshall. But it actually started at the beginning of the climb. 

“My brother was always the smallest on the field, and he was the least fortunate because he broke his elbow going into his freshman year,” Dillon said. “Seeing him do three workouts a day was really inspiring for my upbringing.”

Will used to go from football practice to track workouts to his sprint coach in one day, then get yelled at by their father for trying to squeeze in another workout and not resting his body. Will was the underdog, always called upon last because he was undersized. He had to work that hard to achieve what he did. And young Dillon, studying him, didn’t think, ‘That was my brother’s path.’ He believed that was the only path.

“Will always felt like he had to work a little harder than everybody else,” their father, Billy Mitchell, said. “He always had to do a couple more workouts than everybody else. And Dillon looked at that as the blueprint for how to be successful.” 

Billy gave his boys that blueprint from an early age. As a defensive back on Texas A&M’s famed ‘Wrecking Crew’ defense of the 1990s, Billy knew that to play at the next level, you had to prepare for the next level. Right now, Dillon is training for college. But in elementary school, the brothers worked out like five-star high schoolers. 

Last year, Billy watched some of the boys’ old workout tapes and called them both on the phone.

“First, I’ve got to apologize, because I worked the mess out of y’all when you were little,” Billy said.

Then a pause.

“The second thing, they had to tell me thank you,” Billy said.

In working them as he did, Billy taught the boys to never compare themselves to the kids they saw every day on the field or track. Instead, concoct an image in your mind of the best athlete from another state you know nothing about. Picture him lined up on the starting block next to you, or staring at you from across the line of scrimmage. Because one day, on the biggest stage, he will be. And you’d better be ready.

“You’re not competing against the guys on your team,” Billy said. “You’re not competing against the guys in your league. You’re competing against the guys you don’t see in California, in Florida, in Ohio.”

Dillon grasped that concept early on by training side by side with a brother who was four years older. When Will was finishing a workout for the Junior Olympics, he and Dillon raced for three 80-yard sprints. Obviously, Will won. Comparing a 9-year-old boy to a 13-year-old teenager is like a French Bulldog racing in the Kentucky Derby.

“Dillon’s response to losing to his brother was, ‘I feel like if I worked a little bit harder, I could’ve beaten him,’” Billy said

Dillon has never lined up in a race he didn’t belong in. This spring, he competed against Olympic gold medalist Noah Lyles, NCAA Indoor Champion Jordan Anthony, and World Indoor Champion Trayvon Bromell.  And while the world applauded him for keeping pace in a losing effort, Dillon’s response was the exact same as when his brother used to beat him. If he had gotten a better start out of the blocks, he could’ve beaten them.

“I can assure you Dillon didn’t feel like the underdog in that race,” Sheldon C.E. King head coach Cory Laxen said. “Dillon believes he could’ve won that race. He didn’t show up as a sophomore (in football) thinking he was the underdog. He knew that was his position, and he was going to take it.”

That race against world-class sprinters was one of the many times Dillon has gone viral this school year. From helping Sheldon C.E. King go from 5-5 to its first state championship with 1,800 all-purpose yards, to setting national records, his achievements have been blasted all over social media. Track athletes from around the nation direct message Dillon videos of their 100-meter dashes so he can critique their form. And while Billy prepared him to excel on the field, there was no way he could prepare him for all the hype that success would bring as a man who grew up in the 1990s.  

“God only puts on you what you can handle,” Billy said. “There’s no way I could’ve handled the amount of success Dillon has had and remained as humble and gracious as he has. It takes a special kind of personality to take on all the success, to have all these people saying all these wonderful things about you, and not turn out to be an asshole.”

It’s easy to stay grounded when your fame brings so many reminders of where you came from. The Mitchell family is geographically spread out, with relatives ranging from Ohio and Georgia to Beaumont, Dallas, and Bryan. But with Dillon’s races making the rounds on social media, he’s running across the screen of family members who haven’t seen him since he was a baby. Now, they call Billy to ask what time he’s running so they can stream it live. 

“My mom told me years ago that my kids would probably be the ones to pull our family together,” Billy said. “Cousins that he didn’t even know he had have reached out to him to wish him luck. It’s been great for him to have an opportunity to expand his family and inner circle.”

Now, every track meet is like a Mitchell family reunion. The next get-together is set for Saturday afternoon in Austin when Dillon competes at the UIL State Track and Field meet. Dillon is asked how cool it’d be to see all his family members if he makes state, considering he hadn’t yet qualified at the time of this interview. 

“You said, ‘If’ he makes it to state,” Laxen said. “Dillon’s probably pissed off that you said that because he probably booked rooms this time last year. He talks things into existence.”

Because the secret to Dillon’s success is not the strength or speed, it’s his mind. Billy coached Dillon’s 9U little league football team to the semifinals. With 90 seconds left in the game, the other team scored what felt like the game-winning touchdown. The stadium erupted. As Billy’s eyes scanned the stands, it felt like a high school game. He was in a trance, but Dillon’s voice snapped him out of it. 

“Dad, why are they cheering like that?” Dillon asked.

“They just scored,” Billy said, a little taken aback by the stadium’s chaos, and the fact Dillon had called him ‘Dad’ instead of ‘Coach.’ Almost like they were in the backyard instead of the biggest game of the year.

“But the game isn’t over,” Dillon said. “We still have time.”

At that moment, Billy believed that Dillon might be different. His hunch was confirmed before the clock struck zero.

“Three plays later, he’s dancing in the end zone again,” Billy said.

Dillon’s confidence is contagious, and it’s seeping through Sheldon C.E. King’s football team. After Mitchell set the Bluebonnet Meet record at Texas A&M and reeled in a bunch of scholarships, his teammates realized that track could actually be an avenue to college football and not just a chore.

“He goes out and gets all these offers, and the next week we show up to track practice, and instead of the three lines for the 100-meter dash lining up, we had nine,” Laxen said.

As the group lines up over and over, some teammates wonder why Dillon is still running as hard on the fifth rep as he was on the first. Why is he not coasting when he’s already 10 yards ahead? It’s because Dillon doesn’t see them when he’s running. He sees his brother striding ahead of him, or Noah Lyles about to cross the finish line. He’s picturing some five-star athlete from another state he doesn’t know about, but whose ass he must kick. 

“Worry about the ghosts you don’t see,” Billy always told him.

So when you watch Dillon Mitchell take off in the Class 6A 100-meter State Final, just know he’s chasing a ghost. You might think he’s winning, but he’s actually gaining on someone you cannot see. We don’t know if he’ll ever catch that ghost. But he might set a record in the process.