Butts wins high jump, second in LJ
By Christopher Hunt
The second her back touched the mat her face turned red. She tried to hide the shock behind her hands but the tears in her eyes sold her out.
Tynita Butts’ two hands covered her mouth while she walked back from the high jump mat to where she placed her warm-ups. She still sat in disbelief until the final jumper missed and Butts, a junior from TC Williams (Alexandria, Va.) won the high jump in 5 feet, 8 1/2 inches, a personal-best by two inches.
“I’m done right now,” Butts said. “My legs are screaming.”
That’s because the high jump was the last of the four events she competed in Friday at the National Scholastic Indoor Championships. She finished second in the long jump in 19-5 1/2, just a half-inch off Vashti Thomas of Mount Pleasant (Calif.), who won the national title in 19-6. She also competed in the 60 meters and ran a 200 leg on her team’s sprint medley relay.
“It’s stressful,” Butts said about competing in so many events at once. “But I try not to think about it. I think of this as my playground and I come here to play.”
The fatigue in her legs mixed with the constant pain she felt from the shin splits that have been plaguing Butt since last year led to her shock in the high jump.
“I didn’t think I was going to make it,” she said. “I thought I was going to clip it with my leg or something. When I got over it I just thought that wasn’t me. God lifted me over that bar.”
It also came from the fact that Butts really thought she had the best chance to win the long jump. Only Butts and Suffern sophomore Jen Clayton (third, 19-2) had jumped 20 feet this season. Instead Thomas popped 19-6 on her first attempt and no one could match her mark.
“The competition was great here,” Thomas said. “Everyone really pushed me to do what I did. I tried not to think about the competition or that I was ahead. I try to always think of myself in last place so I keep pushing myself.”
The Ridgewood (N.J.) girls shuttle hurdles relay didn’t come into the meet with much expectations at all. Yet after the rounds they found themselves in a tie with Lake Braddock (Va.) for first place in 35.23 seconds. Ridgewood’s Mia Martinez, Emily Barr, Victoria Oliva and Kate Michel were on the medal stand before they knew they had edged Lake Braddock by two-hundredths of a second.
“We were going into this thinking hopefully that we would place,” Martinez said. “We were just hoping to get sixth. To get first place is just unreal.”
A win became real and apparent very early for Kingsway Regional (Woolwich Township, N.J.) sophomore Chelsea Ley. She controlled the tempo almost from the beginning and never saw a challenge while winning the 5,000 in 17:03.79.
“I’ve always wanted to win a national title,” she said. “This is like a dream for me.”
Ley finished second last year. She said not knowing what to expect in the race left her a bit unfocused. But this year she stuck with her plan and raced the clock, focusing on her splits instead of her competition.
“The plan was to run 40 or 41 seconds each lap and I did that with a few 42’s,” she said. “I felt good.”
Ley will also compete in the 2-mile Sunday. She said she hopes that Friday’s race put some people on alert.
“I definitely think today puts my name out there,” Ley said. “I had to come out and prove myself today. Before this race I wasn’t even mentioned. I think people can look at me now and say, ‘Wow, who’s this girl?’ So, I think Sunday they’ll be looking out for me.”
Cardozo (Queens, N.Y.) won its second straight national title in the sprint medley relay. Tessa West (26.1), Altyna Johnson (25.1), Dalilah Muhammad (55.5) and Allison Lee (2:16.5) finished in 4:03.16. The Judges led after the first two legs until Motor City’s 400-meter leg stormed by Muhammad on their first lap. Muhammad made a move to pass with 150 left but Motor City’s quarter-miler tried to fend her off but Muhammad beat her to the final curve, built a gap and Lee put the field away.
“I really couldn’t tell how I was running at first,” Muhammad said. “I figured I wasn’t running that fast when she went by me so I knew I could make a move at the end. I didn’t want to wait until the turn because I wanted to give Allison a lead.”
Lee, who will compete at Harvard next year, disheartened the chase pack by careening through the first 200 in 30 seconds and then through the 400 mark in 61.
“I know I took it out too fast but my body just couldn’t slow down,” said Lee, who wasn’t on last year’s championship relay. “This is really big for us and our tradition and hopefully it carries over into the 4x800 Sunday.”
Warwick Valley won the distance medley relay in 11:44.44, the fourth-best time in U.S. history and fastest this season with the squad of Claire Pettit, Kristen Jados, Tori Pennings and Lillian Greibesland.
“I was telling myself this is my last chance to do this so I want to give it all I’ve got,” Pettit said.
The field was stocked with New York teams which gave a familiarity to Warwick that no other event had. The fact that Saratoga Springs, the only team to run faster than Warwick before Friday, wasn’t in the race, only added to their confidence.
“But you have to have a balance between being scared and being confident,” Pennings said. “You want to be confident without being cocky.”
Reach Christopher Hunt at chunt@armorytrack.com.
