4×200 Relay Masters: Record-setting Cougars meet original record holders | Newspaper

SHENANDOAH JUNCTION — Jefferson’s record-breaking 2024 4×200-meter relay team met the 1980 Cougars team that held the relay mark for 44 years.

The older quartet, all in their 60s, still appear to be able to compete with the current team that circled the track last month at Laidley Field at the University of Charleston Stadium to break the established state record in 1980 and equaled in 1994.

For 44 years the time of 1 minute 43.54 seconds was held until Jefferson ran a time of 1:43.11 a few weeks ago by the team of Arayia Maiben, Jayla Kidrick, Jazmyn Taylor and Imani Wood.

Neither team knew they had set a state record.

The 1980 unit of Venus (Nelson) Brown, Tonda (Lee) Emanuel, Joy Washington and Veronica Nelson found out when they returned to school.

It didn’t seem so bad at the time, they recalled, that it didn’t attract the attention it might have otherwise.

Brown said the unit was virtually unchallenged throughout the season.

Some coaches won the last state record-holding unit.

“We didn’t even know,” Taylor said. “We didn’t even think they were telling the truth.”

The 1980 team agreed that perhaps they could have run faster if they had known they were setting a record.

Emanuel said that during the 1980s competition, there was a really squishy new track in Charleston “that no one was used to.” They have been operating on ashes throughout their career.

The new surface, however, paved the way for other school records and other events for individuals and relay teams.

“I honestly don’t even remember,” Brown said. “We were flying.

“We had no competition.”

Until this year’s team.

Their coaches, Jim Taylor and “Coach Roush,” had changed the makeup of the relays since the team’s debut in 1980. The coaches reversed the order of the relay, and obviously, it worked for 44 years.

Both Nelsons are the aunts of Shardell Twyman, one of Jefferson’s best sprinters in history.

Taylor, who won the individual 100m and long jump on her way to the top prize in only her second season of athletics, believes the new record will stand for “10 to 20 years – maybe”.

Beyond the record, the Cougar girls stood alone as state team champions after sharing the title a year earlier with Morgantown.

“It was amazing,” Taylor said. “Last year we didn’t even manage to bring home the big trophy. We had to wait for ours to arrive. They gave it to Morgantown.

Maiben took charge of the 2024 team.

“I’ve always tried to give my team a lead,” she said, “but I don’t really know where the disconnect is.”

They didn’t have the best time in the state, but the Cougars won by 0.88 over Woodrow Wilson, who had the best time, and Huntington, who was second.

The same four runners won the championship in the 4×100 race, even though they were running in a slower race.

“I didn’t know we could do it,” said Kidrick, who is headed to West Virginia University for pre-med.

As for the record, she said: “It feels like one of those things that we worked really hard for. This is not something we expected.

“People say, ‘You’re really good,’ but we worked hard. We watched the record…but you never know you’re that good until you’re good.

The four Cougars were practicing on the track Monday in preparation for the New Balance Nationals in nine days at Franklin Field in Philadelphia.

“We usually go there,” Kidrick said. “We have the opportunity to see how good we are compared to the world coming from such a small area. »

The 1980 team learned their record had been eclipsed in a number of ways: a Facebook post, a husband and a co-worker.

Even though they no longer hold the record, the 1980 crew is excited for the 2024 runners.

The original record holders couldn’t be persuaded to run the girls with the current record – just to see if the newbies could keep up with the originals.

“I’m proud of them too,” Brown said.