Jones Wins National Track Award

As expected, Marion Jones of Rio Mesa High was honored as Gatorade’s national high school female track and field athlete of the year at an awards ceremony Tuesday in Oxnard.

The selection of the 15-year-old sophomore marked the first time in the six years of the award that it has been given to an underclassman, and it was the second time that a Rio Mesa athlete has received the award.

Angela Burnham of UCLA, who spoke about Jones at Tuesday’s presentation, won the award as a Rio Mesa senior in 1989.

“It feels great,” Jones said of the honor. “We set some goals for me at the start of the season and I reached them, then surpassed them. It went better than I ever expected it to.”

The award capped an impressive June for Jones.

She won the 100 and 200 meters June 1 at the state championships, then finished fourth in the 200 and eighth in the 100 at The Athletics Congress championships two weeks later.

The top three finishers in each event qualified for the U. S. team which will compete in the World Championships in Tokyo, Aug. 24-Sept. 1.

She concluded her season last weekend with wins in the 100 and 200 at the TAC Junior (19 and under) meet at the National Sports Center in Blaine, Minn.

“She had a fantastic season,” Rio Mesa co-Coach Brian FitzGerald said. “She might have had the greatest sprint season ever by a high school girl.”

Jones set a national high school record of 22.76 seconds in the 200 at the TAC meet, and her time of 11.17 in the 100 at the state meet tied her for second on the all-time high school performer list.

She also ran 52.91 in the 400 at the Southern Section 3-A Division meet in May, the fastest girls’ time in the nation this year.