Griggs at Junior Olympics

Alameda's Griggs competed in Junior Olympics national championships
By Phil Jensen
STAFF writer
Article Launched: 07/28/2008 11:18:14 AM PDT

One year ago at this time, Alameda's Kellie Grigg did not know anything about the USA Track & Field Junior Olympics.

Now she knows a lot about them. Grigg, who will be a junior this fall at Alameda High School, competed in the JO national championships last week in Omaha, Nebraska.

"It's really been incredible," said Grigg in a phone interview on July 27. "I didn't know going into this that I would go so far."

In her first year of summer club track and field, Grigg advanced to the Junior Olympic national championships in the 200 meters with a second-place finish in the Intermediate Girls division of the USATF Junior Olympic Region 14 meet at Granada High School on July 12. She set a personal-best time of 26.10 seconds in the event in that meet, and just missed qualifying for the nationals in the 400 and long jump.

In a 200 preliminary heat in Omaha on July 24, Grigg finished sixth in her heat with a wind-aided time of 26.30 seconds. The time was not one of the top eight times in the preliminaries and did not qualify for the finals, but Grigg enjoyed the experience.

"It's been really fun ... I'm so thankful I got the chance," she said. "Everyone is so talented. My team is really good."

Grigg said that she was approached a few months ago by Flying Jaguars coach Josh Tezeno, who is also the head coach of Hercules High School, about running for his team this summer.

"I had no idea about the Junior Olympics. He
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said 'That's the goal,'" Grigg said.

Grigg has concentrated on sprinting events in high school competition, running the 100, 200, 400 relay and 1,600 relay. But she was encouraged by Tezeno, whose high school girls team finished second in the 2007 California Interscholastic Federation state championships, to try other events.

"He taught me to do the long jump... I had never run an open 400 before this summer," said Grigg, who has also done hurdle work with assistant coach Meia Tezeno, who runs at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas.

In two of those events, Grigg was on the verge of qualifying for the Junior Olympic nationals with personal record at the regional meet. She was fourth in the 400 (1:01.07) and fifth in the long jump with a wind-aided leap of 16 feet, 73/4 inches. Her previous best was 14-10.

Last week's trip was her first to Nebraska. Judging by her quick improvement this summer, Grigg could be making more long-distance trips in her track and field career.