Tag: Jared

Competing against a field of 53 top jumpers from across the United States, Jared matched his 14th place incoming seed position with a lead-off 6.28m 20’7.25″ jump in the 15-16yo long jump at the USATF Junior Olympic Championships (results, photos).

He was the #2 jumper from the Northeast and 9th freshman. All the jumpers who beat him had 22+ foot PRs going into the meet. This was a tremendously deep meet with 24 jumpers exceeding 20 feet. Jared’s performance was quite good factoring in the headwind and the flat pit.

Nanny and Papa set a new Prior family record of driving 24 hours to see 24 seconds of competition.

This concluded a year of 24 long jump competitions for Jared.

The Newton tab included a long article Wednesday celebrating his representing the town in the meet (scan of newspaper, web):

Newton duo in Nationals Tour
Martin, Prior compete in Junior Olympics in N. Carolina

WALTHAM —
Starting this fall, Newton track and field athletes Clare Martin and Jared Prior will be competing on opposite sides of town as part of the Newton South and Newton North programs, respectively.
This week, however, both are representing the Waltham Youth Track Club at the Junior Olympic National Championship in Greensboro, N.C.

Martin, the recent Brown Middle School graduate who will be a freshman at South High this fall, will run the 1,500 in her first trip to Nationals as a track athlete after previously competing in cross country. Prior, who will be a sophomore at North, will be making his fourth appearance at a national meet, but his first with the WTC after previously going independently and with a contingent of North High teammates.

Both said during a practice at Waltham’s J. Lee Gould Track last week that they were taking high hopes with them to North Carolina.
Prior, who helped North to the Division 1 Eastern Mass. and All-States championships with his performance in the long jump this spring, was also eyeing a possible spot in the 15-16 boys national finals with a good jump after also taking first at the Region 1 final in New York.

“It’s a very deep meet,” he said. “There are a lot of jumpers doing much better than I am. I have started to really appreciate the importance of when I execute. That’s what I want to go down there and do. I’ve been fouling a lot of jumps, and to get in the finals down there I will need to have a big jump.”

Prior joined the WTC last year at the urging of his older sister, Kayla, who was both a member of WTC and the All-State champion North girls track and field team a year ago.

“It helps a lot that she did it,” he said. “It’s pretty much why I’m here. Before I started doing track, she was nagging a lot that I should try track. So I started out at the middle school. Then when I realized I wanted to be serious about it, I started coming here when I got to the high school just to get the technical stuff down.

“I first jumped 20 feet in eighth grade. I thought that I did that without yet being super special in form. So I thought track was my sport.”
…
The Newton athletes were two of the WTC’s 25 national qualifiers from the Region 1 meet. Newton’s Adrianna Batista, Orenna Brand, Max Hernandez and Rose Teszler also competed in New York.
The Junior Olympic Nationals began Monday and conclude on Sunday.

In the last running meet of his freshman season, Jared ran a personal best 11.41 FAT to win the 100m at the 2013 Bay State Games at Regis College on 7/13 against returning high schoolers. This 100m ranks 3rd in New England among freshman. His time was 0.64 faster than his junior win last year.

He also too 2nd in the long jump in 20′ 9.75″ and 2nd in the 200m in 23.08 — his fastest electronically timed 200m, and 2nd best ever. Both the LJ and 200m time rank ahead of all NE freshman. His long jump was 2 feet farther than his 2012 Bay State Games Junior Record jump last year.

Jared won the USATF Region 1 Junior Olympic 15-16yo Long Jump with a 21′ 1.5″ jump on Saturday at Icahn Stadium in New York City (results, video, photos). The meet consisted of athletes from New England and New York. The top 5 in each event from the 16 regions across the country advance to the Junior Olympic Nationals in Greensboro later this month.

He came into the meet seeded 2nd, but bested his nearest competition by nearly 2 feet. His 21′ 1.5″ mark is the 3rd best mark achieved in the Region 1 meet in the past 14 years. He was 5th in this meet last year (18’7.75″), and 2nd in 2011 as a 13-14yo (17′ 3.5″).

His last jump (a foul) measured at 21’11”:

Jared also ran the 400m in 52.93 for 6th in the 92 deg F heat:

Jared won the USATF New England Junior Olympic age 15-16 Long Jump competition at Fitchburg State with a 20′ 2″ jump (photos). Having the meet likely wrapped up after his 1st jump, he was aggressive in his subsequent jumps and got out to around the 22′ mark but fouled. 2nd place was 18’7″. He previous won this event two years ago in the 13-14yo division.

He also placed 2nd in the 400m in 52.14, coming on strong wit a reverse-split 25.8 final 200m, but lost by 0.03 (see video). He is in white in lane 4.

These performances qualify him to compete in the Northeast Region meet at Icahn Stadium on Randalls Island in New York. on Saturday July 6th (info packet), with the long jump going off at 11:30am and the 400m at 2:15pm. If he places top 5 at that meet, he advances to the National meet in Greensboro with long jump on Thursday July 25th at 1:30pm and 400m on Friday at 11am.

Jared earned perhaps the highest accolade in his track career thus far Friday, placing third in the 2013 New Balance Nationals Freshman Long Jump competition (results, photos, patch article).

Jared got a big kick out of being featured in the New Balance Friday Highlight Video at 0:22 and 0:37:

He came in on paper tied as top seed, although the late entry of Grant Holloway from Virginia, the USA #1 track freshman in high jump(6’11”), 110m hurdles(14.45), and 300m hurdles (38.56), as well as the USA #3 400m (48.58), and (now) USA #9 in long jump (22’3″) made winning a long shot. Holloway is also indoor national frosh champ at 60m and 400m.

After having to abort his first jump mid-air due to officials yelling “stop” to exiting 100m runners nearly cutting him off, Jared rested just a moment and then opened with a 20’8″ jump. He held the meet record (for the new event 🙂 for 10 minutes until Holloway opened with a 22’0″ jump.

Jared kept Holloway on his toes, with Holloway’s 22′ jump being an inch outside Jared’s PR of 21’11” from the D1 state meet. Jared held 2nd until the final round when Tyson Spears from Roswell, Georgia jumped 21’1″. Jared countered with another 21’0″ jump on his final attempt.

Looking at Jared’s three previous National Championship competitions, he has improved 5 feet in last 3 years:
2011 USATF Youth Nationals — 16’0″ — 11th
2012 USATF Youth Nationals — 19’2″ — 6th
2013 New Balance Nationals — 21’0″ — 3rd

I extracted the New Balance clips and the audio and combined it with my videos of his 1st and 4th jump to make a highlight video. Use this link http://youtu.be/UeqfHviw0V8 if you want to share it.

Check it out:

There are also videos of his 2nd and 3rd attempt on runnerspace (clink on the links).

Jared also ran his 2nd open 400m of his career, running a slower than hoped 53.10 for 19th after a long day in the sun and heat(New Balance Video of section 3 of freshman 400m):

Results
1 1092 Grant Holloway 16 Chesapeake, VA 6.79m 3.0 22-03.50
6.72m(1.8) 6.68m(2.1) 6.54m(1.9) 6.54m(1.8) 6.79m(3.0) 6.46m(2.4)
2 3141 Tyson Spears 16 Roswell, GA 6.44m 2.3 21-01.50
5.15m(2.4) 5.77m(1.5) 6.35m(1.8) 6.20m(1.2) 6.10m(0.7) 6.44m(2.3)
3 3304 Jared Prior 16 Newton, MA 6.40m 4.4 21-00.00
6.30m(2.5) 6.40m(4.4) 6.26m(2.6) 6.21m(1.5) 6.04m(3.4) 6.40m(2.2)
4 209 Chris Evans 16 Indianapolis, IN 6.36m 2.1 20-10.50
5.36m(1.9) 6.36m(2.1) 6.17m(2.6) 6.04m(1.9) 6.29m(1.8) 6.16m(2.2)
5 3618 Isaac Perrigan 16 Abingdon, VA 6.32m 1.9 20-09.00
FOUL(4.2) 6.13m(2.9) 6.32m(1.9) FOUL(0.7) 6.01m(0.9) 5.60m(3.2)
6 830 Coleton Banks 16 denver, NC 6.18m 2.5 20-03.50
FOUL(2.5) FOUL(2.8) 5.76m(0.5) 6.02m(1.1) 6.18m(2.5) 6.17m(1.2)
7 836 Luke Lafferty 16 Manorville, NY 6.15m 1.9 20-02.25
FOUL(2.8) FOUL(2.1) 6.03m(3.9) 5.63m(2.1) 6.02m(2.2) 6.15m(1.9)
8 1016 Allan Jacob 16 Freehold, NJ 6.08m 1.7 19-11.50
5.86m(1.7) 5.83m(3.2) 6.08m(1.7) 4.34m(1.1) PASS PASS
9 1310 Austin Leonard 16 Niverville, NY 5.52m 0.7 18-01.50
5.10m(2.7) 5.52m(0.7) 5.38m(0.9)
10 3730 Jalen Smith 16 birmingham, AL 5.22m 0.5 17-01.50
5.22m(0.5) 4.96m(2.0) 4.96m(1.7)

Jared ran his 1st open 400m at the New Balance Twilight Meet Saturday night at Bentley College (results, photos). He placed 6th in a state-qualifying PR 51.85 that ranks #4 in New England behind Abu Ceesay from Gambia (see Nothing can stop Ceesay) and 2nd in MA. Nationally it ranks him 157th out of 24,000 freshman runners. He currently ranks #1 in New England in frosh long jump and 200m. His long jump national frosh rank is at 19th of 21,000.

It also gave him an official and faster qualifier for the New Balance Freshman 400m on Friday, as they had flagged the relay split submitted (entries). The twilight meets have a range of high school, college, and post grad runners shooting for qualifying times.

Lisa and I were at Special Olympics all day. Jared decided to run meet at 4pm and we got over to Bentley just under the wire at 4:30pm for race-day entry. In other news, Jared’s two Massachusetts Middle School Championship records in long jump and 4x100m survived the 3rd annual middle school meet yesterday. I think the 4x100m has a shot at lasting as two event limits will often lead strong runners to run individual events instead. Jared took team approach with 4×1 team.

See New Balance Video from FloTrack below (Jared in Purple shirt in lane 4) with race commentators:

Jared placed 2nd in the 200m and 3rd in the long jump at the 2013 Bay State Conference Outdoor Track Championships (results, photos, jump sequences).

In the 200m he ran 24.00 into a headwind to place 2nd behind the fastest runner in the state (UConn-bound indoor 55m state open champion PJ Hayes).

In the long jump he jumped 20′ 0.75″ to place 3rd behind teammate and New England #1 triple jumper David Oluwadara and indoor league MVP Jason Motovu from Norwood.

Only one other freshman got a top 3 finish in any event in the 12-school league.

Bay-State All-Star voting remains to be completed, but Jared has set himself up well for consideration by performing well in this meet and ending the league season as the #1 ranked long jumper, #3 ranked 200m runner, anchor of Newton North’s 7-0 4x100m team, and (I think) 5th highest dual meet scorer in league.

Long Jump Video: