After being on the call for a long two exciting days at the brand new indoor track facility in Virginia Beach, let me share what was the best race by far of many great performances produced at the Virginia Beach Club Opener in the fast section of the high school boys 400 meter dash.
Boys 400 - 3 Under 48 Seconds!
Last indoor season, only 7 boys in the entire nation break 48 seconds for 400 meters. In one race and the first-ever meet at the Virginia Beach Sports Center, we witnessed 3 boys go under that time in an impressive foreshadow of what kind of performances that this venue could generate for the quarter mile.
Justin Braun, who led the nation one year ago running a best of 46.77 at the Ohio state indoor championships, was able to get past L.C. Bird's Jayson Ward coming off the final turn for a 47.82 victory. Only a junior at Thom. Worthington High School in Ohio, Braun has won state titles both indoors and outdoors in the event and was a 2019 AAU national champion as well.
Ward, last year's Virginia Class 5 state champion in the 500 and 300 meter dash, broke 48 seconds for the first time indoors and not far off his 47.61 outdoor best as the runner-up in 47.89. Ward got out the fastest to hold the slight advantage after at the break line over Braun and Jaylen Barringer in the fast section of the event.
Jaylen Barringer, a senior at Freedom High School in Woodbridge, might have been the biggest surprise performance among the trio in his third place PR of 47.99. However, only one has to look to his progression over the summer when he made the finals and placed in all 3 events at the AAU Olympic Games in Florida running 48.36 in the 400 (4th), 21.22 in the 200 (4th), and 10.83 in the 100 (5th). All AAU performances were PR's.