Elise Cooper To Make Outdoor Season Debut After Winning 200m National Title At New Balance Nationals Indoor; Bullis MD Contingent Well Represented Once Again

By Oliver Hinson of DyeStat

Adam Parshall file photo

Although it’s come to be known by several names over the years, the All American Track Classic has brought elite competition to the Southeast since 1991. This year is no exception.

Hosted by Spring Valley High School in Columbia, South Carolina, the meet will feature some of the best high school athletes in the country this Friday and Saturday April 11-12

The biggest name on the track is Elise Cooper, the McDonogh MD senior and Texas commit who won the 200 meter dash at New Balance Nationals Indoor and shattered the national record in the 300 meter dash at The CIRCUIT Philadelphia. 

She’ll be working the extremes — relatively speaking — this weekend, taking on the 100 and 400 meter races. Her personal bests in those events are 11.40 seconds and 54.01 seconds, respectively (but her outdoor 400 PB is 57.46).

Neither of those times are too far off the meet records; the 100 meter record is 11.30 by Chalonda Goodman in 2009, and the 400 record is 53.71 by Brianna Nelson in the same year. This is Cooper’s first invitational of the outdoor season.

She’ll have good competition in the 400; she’s lining up against Morgan Rothwell (Bullis MD) and Sophie Rambo (Grassfield VA), both of whom boast faster personal bests. Rothwell ran 53.80 last year to take the win at East Coast Elite, and Rambo ran 53.23 in the prelims at New Balance Nationals Indoor this March. Rambo likely has the advantage heading into the race, having run 54.60 for an easy win at the CNU’s HS Captains Classic two weekends ago. Rothwell, meanwhile, hasn’t raced since March 1, when she took fifth at The CIRCUIT Philadelphia with a 55.92 performance.

That being said, the rest of the Bullis squad will have their fingerprints all over this meet. On the girls’ side, Kassidy Hopkins and Tatum Lynn are entered in the 100 meter hurdles and 400 meter hurdles, respectively. Hopkins opened up her outdoor season with a 13.37 performance at the Florida Relays two weekends ago, good for US#5. That mark would rank second on the all-time meet list (although she was aided by an illegal wind of 3.1 meters per second). Lynn, meanwhile, ran a personal best 54.97 in the flat 400 meters that weekend. Her PB in the 400 meter hurdles is 1:00.22, which would put her fifth on the all-time meet list.

The Bulldogs are also sending teams in the 4x100, 4x200, 4x400 and 4x800 meter relays. They currently hold the US#1 mark in the 4x400 with a 3:35.44 performance from the Florida Relays, and their 4x800 sits at US#6. In the indoor season, they broke the national records in the 4x200 and 4x400 with marks of 1:34.26 and 3:35.54.

On the boys’ side, Cameron Homer and Colin Abrams will represent the Bulldogs. Abrams clocked a US#3 1:49.75 in the 800 meters at the Florida Relays, and he’ll be running the 800 again this weekend. He should easily break the meet record, which stands at 1:51.02 from over a decade ago. Homer, meanwhile, hasn’t raced this outdoor season, but he may still have some positive momentum from his bronze finish in the 400 meters at New Balance Nationals Indoor. He’s racing the 400 on Saturday, and if he can knock a few tenths off his PB, he’ll take down the meet record of 46.34.

Ja’Neil Harris will headline the boys’ short sprints. The T.W. Andrews NC senior has been looking for a marquee win for a while, and this weekend, he has a great shot to win the 100 and 200 meters. At the Florida Relays, he picked up third and fourth place finishes in the 100 and 400, respectively, and he took third in the 300 meter dash at the Millrose Games in February. 

Harris is going up against South Carolinians Jayden Wilson and Tydarion Grier in the 100. Neither Wilson nor Grier competed at national championship meets in the indoor season, and both are well into their outdoor campaigns. Harris has the fastest PB at 10.36, but not by much; Grier has run 10.42 and Wilson has run 10.48.

In the 200, the challengers are Jayden Boyd and Corey Steed, another pair of South Carolinians. Like Wilson and Grier, both are deep into their outdoor seasons, and both have hit stellar marks in the 200. On the same day in late March, at two different installments of the same meet series (the Bob Jenkins Coaches Classic), Boyd and Steed ran 21.15 and 21.10, respectively. Harris’s PB is only slightly faster at 21.00.

Kymora-Lee Williams is attempting the sprint double on the girls’ side. The John Overton TN senior and South Carolina commit took seventh in the 60 meter dash at Nike Indoor Nationals, and last year, she took fifth in both the 100 and 200 at New Balance Nationals Outdoor.

Cardinal Gibbons NC teammates Kaitlyn Estep and Hannah Shaffer are taking on the distance events — Estep, a freshman, is entered in the mile, and Shaffer, a senior, is entered in the 3,200 meters. Estep’s 4:49.99 mile personal best is 17th in the country (allowing 1600 conversions) and second among freshmen. 

Meanwhile, Hannah Grace will look to continue her dominance in the pole vault. She hasn’t lost a competition since Nike Outdoor Nationals last spring, and she’s already cleared 14 feet twice this outdoor season. The meet record is 13’8”.

Brett Jones will also look to keep an undefeated season alive in the javelin. She already has nine competitions under her belt, and she recorded a 161-3 heave at a home meet in mid-March, giving her the second-best mark in the country.

Other top names include Elena Cooper (McDonogh MD, girls 200 meters), Kaleb Burroughs (West Florence SC, boys mile), and Tommy Pringle (Cuthbertson NC, boys high jump).