It was a historic Friday at Todd Stadium and that was in no small part thanks to the heroic effort of Jada Foreman. The Atlee junior scored a monstrous 43 points to come within a single point of winning the state team title... by herself!
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Ultimately winning the team title with their sixth place finish in the 4x400m relay was Midlothian. Their own star, Caroline Bowe won the 1600 and 800 and then came back to run the fastest split on the 4x400m relay.
Also of note was Bethel's Jahnelle Saunders who took home three wins and scored 35 points on her own. Had it not been for her, Foreman would have scored an additional six points. In her interview, Foreman was quick to note that Saunders really pushed her to be the best athlete she could be in every event and has enjoyed the competition.
Jada won the triple jump with her 39-7 state leading mark and followed it up with a 5-4 high jump (tie-breaker for second) and a 19-1.25 runner-up finish in the long jump. In the running events she finished 4th in the 100mH, 5th in the 300mH, and 2nd place in the 200m dash to total her points to 43.
Those 43 points came from 17 points in the running events and 26 points in the field events. It was also a familiar site for her head coach Neil Mathews who also coached another athlete to a runner-up trophy at states, Rachel Butler.
Foreman's performance had all the old-timers talking at the meet about some of the greats and if anyone had come close to that performance. Some names mentioned were Yvette Lewis, Doug Dickinson, Felecia Majors, and Rachel Butler. You don't need to know all of their stats but you can trust us, when that group of old-timers is bringing up those names when they are talking about her, she did something truly historic.