Egg Harbor junior Xavier Aucule opened the outdoor season with the fastest 400-meter hurdles time by an Egg Harbor athlete in 18 years.
In a dual meet at Atlantic City, Aucule ran 55.67, snapping his PR of 56.00 from his 4th-place finish at South Jersey Group 4 Sectionals last May at Pennsauken.
That’s fastest by an EHT hurdler since Stevenson Cajuste ran 54.94 at the 2008 Penn Relays, back before Penn sadly eliminated the high school 400-meter intermediates.
School record holder is Charles Oglesby, who ran 54.81 at the 1997 state Group 4 meet at South Plainfield.
Aucule is coming off an indoor season that saw him run 50.13 in the flat 400 at the Ott Center and place 4th at Sectionals at the Bubble.
His time is fastest in New Jersey in the early going this outdoor season. Kasey Kinley of Hunterdon Central ran 56.74 this past weekend in a meet in Somerset.
From the Backstretch by Reuben Frank 