A Quick Study, Medearis Paces 5 Area Masters’ Champions : High school track and field: Hart High senior breaks fast and is not headed in high hurdles. Fischer squeaks out win in high jump.

He has been described by his coach as a student of hurdling. Apparently so.

Jason Medearis of Hart High learned from a week-old mistake and won the boys’ 110-meter high hurdles in the Southern Section Masters Meet at Cerritos College on Friday night.

Medearis finished a disappointing third in the highs in the Division I championships at Long Beach Veterans Stadium last week. His miscue in that outing was breaking from the blocks slowly and then compounding his error by paying too much attention to rivals Kenny Haslip of Pasadena Muir and Tyson Murphy of Santa Monica.

This time, he shot out of the blocks and never looked back, recording a time of 14.21 seconds and defeating Division I champion Haslip (14.34) for the second time in seven meetings this season.

“I had a real good feeling because I didn’t see anyone on either side of me at the start of the race,” Medearis said. “And that acted as motivation to keep it that way for the rest of the race.”

Although Haslip bounced back to defeat Medearis in the 300 intermediate hurdles, 36.65 to 36.80, the Hart senior couldn’t complain about his time. It was a personal best by more than half a second and moved him into third on the yearly national high school list behind Lee Hutton (36.5) of La Marque (Tex.) High and Haslip.

It was also the fastest time by an athlete from the region since 1976, when Charles White of San Fernando timed 36.4 to win the 330-yard intermediates in the now-defunct International Prep Invitational.

“Last week definitely helped me tonight,” Medearis said. “It made me think more this week about what I had to do, about what I wanted to accomplish.”

Medearis was among five athletes from the region who posted victories in the meet in which the top five finishers in each event qualified for the state championships at Cerritos, June 3-4.

The others were Jeremy Fischer of Camarillo in the high jump, Esa Sallinen of Burroughs in the pole vault, Jamaal Chase of Quartz Hill in the triple jump and Dolores Tuimoloau of Channel Islands in the girls’ shotput.

Fischer and Arthur Lloyd of Rialto Eisenhower each cleared seven feet in the high jump, but Fischer won because he cleared the height on his second attempt while Lloyd needed three tries.

Fischer also finished third in the long jump at 22-9 3/4.

Sallinen, a senior exchange student from Finland, cleared 16 feet on his second attempt in the pole vault before missing three times at 16-6.

Chase was a double qualifier, finishing second in the long jump (22-10 1/4) and winning the triple jump at 48-10 3/4, his best outdoor mark of the season.

Tuimoloau, the state leader in the girls’ shotput at 49-2, won that event with a mark of 45-1 3/4. She also placed fourth in the discus at 137-1.

Tuimoloau and Palmdale sophomore Kristi Rose both produced clutch throws on their final attempts in the discus to advance to the state meet.

Rose was last in the field of nine after the three of the four rounds, but she threw a personal best of 135-10 on her final effort to temporarily move into fourth and push Tuimoloau (131-11) into sixth.

Unfazed, Tuimoloau calmly stepped in the ring and unleashed an even better throw.

In other events, Brett Strahan of Hart, Antonio Arce of Palmdale, Kim Mortensen of Thousand Oaks, Cathy Prater of Agoura and Liz Giltner of Chaminade placed second in their respective events.

Chase leaped 22-10 1/4 to finish second in the long jump before winning the triple jump at 48-10 3/4, his best outdoor mark of the season.

Strahan ran 4 minutes 14.70 seconds to finish behind Eric Dunn (4:14.47) of Arroyo Grande in the 1,600. Arce timed a yearly region-leading time of 9:09.21 in the 3,200 to finish behind Jaime Martinez (9:06.08) of Orange.

Mortensen ran a region-leading 10:53.65 in the girls’ 3,200; Prater ran the second fastest time (43.96) of her career in the 300 low hurdles; and freshman Giltner cleared a personal best of 5-8 in the high jump.

Jessica De La Cerda of Hart was a notable non-qualifier. She placed ninth in the girls’ 1,600 with a time of 5:47.00.