After a two-day break (why do the Trials just stop for two days in the middle? Anybody know?), the U.S. Olympic Trials resume Thursday with Winslow Township grad Tionna Tobias and Paul VI’s Aliya Garozzo both in action.
The versatile Tobias, from the University of Iowa, will make her Olympic Trials debut not in the heptathlon – the event she won at the Big Ten Championships last year – or in the high hurdles – where she has speedy 13.11 PR – but in the long jump.
Tobias PR’d at 21-4 ¼ with a legal wind on her final jump at the Pepsi Relays in Gainesville back in March. That broke her PR of 21-0 ½ from an indoor meet in February in Albuquerque, N. Mex.
The top 12 jumpers Thursday will advance to the final. Tobias is ranked 20th among U.S. women this year, although it’s a safe bet that none of the 19 ahead of her were competing in so many other events. Sticking to just the long jump at the Trials gives Tobias a rare luxury of focusing on one event.
The long jump starts at 9:18 p.m. Thursday and the final is scheduled for 8:20 p.m. Saturday.
Garozzo runs in her first Trials at 9:49 p.m. Garozo is racing in the 4th of five sections of the 400-meter hurdles. She’ll be in Lane 7, two lanes over from two-time Olympic gold medalist Dalilah Muhammad , who starts in Lane 5.
The top five finishers in each of the five races plus the next two-fastest advance to a three-race semifinal. The top two in each semifinal race plus the next three fastest advance to the final.
Garozzo had a remarkable breakthrough season as a Penn junior, capped by a 56.34 win in the Ivy League Championships at Princeton. That’s 4th-fastest ever by a New Jersey native, behind only world record holder and Olympic gold medalist Sydney McLaughlin [50.68 in 2022], Rancocas Valley’s Tonya Lee [55.78 in 1996] an Winslow’s Krystal Cantey [56.21 in 2007].
Garozzo, who’s from Sicklerville, rran 1:00.16 as a high school junior in 2019 when she placed 5th at Greensboro Nationals but lost her senior year to COVID. She ran a limited season in 2021 as a Quaker freshman but dipped under a minute in the spring of 2022 with a 59.76 at the Ivy League Championships, where she placed 2nd (and finished just ahead of Princeton’s Arianna Smith of Pennsville). She was limited by injuries to just three meets last spring but opened this season with a monster 57.97 PR in Gainesville before her 56.34 last month.
Other New Jersey athletes competing Thursday include Hopewell Valley’s Sean Dolan and Tim McInerney of CBA in the 800, Jameson Woodell of Hunterdon Central and Rutgers and Ryan Matulonis of Seton Hall Prep and Penn in the 400-meter hurdles, Sam Mattis from East Brunswick in the discus, Travis Mahoney of Old Bridge and Temple in the 5,000, Rider’s Teagan Schein-Becker ion the first round of the women’s 1,500 and McLaughlin in the intermediates.
On Friday, Pleasantville’s Nia Ali runs the 100-meter hurdles at 8:23 p.m., Cherry Hill East’s Johnie Jackson competes in the hammer throw at 7:30 p.m. and Jessica Woodard of Cherokee throws the shot at 10:15 p.m.
From the Backstretch by Reuben Frank 