Jackson struggles; prepares for rest of meet

UW sophomore Britney Jackson

Heptathlon final results

MWC team scores

By Rob Ketcham
Special to Wyoming Sports.org

Different day, same results for Wyoming sophomore Britney Jackson.

After finishing the first segment in last place on Wednesday, Jackson stayed put in the standings with the conclusion of the heptathlon at the Mountain West Conference Outdoor Track and Field Championships Thursday at the Louis S. Madrid Sports Complex.

In the first event of the day, the long jump, Jackson pulled off a distance of 17-feet, 1 inch, taking fifth overall. While the distance was Jackson’s personal record, her third of the competition, none of the athletes were able to keep up with Brigham Young University’s junior phenom Amy Menlove, who dominated the event with a jump of 20-5.

Hoping to take the momentum from the long jump into her two least favorite events, Jackson’s overall struggles continued in both the javelin throw and 800-meter run. After tying for eighth in the javelin, it was apparent that Jackson purposely didn’t give her full effort in the seventh event and final event of the heptathlon.

“At the end of the day today, we made the conscious decision to not put everything into the 800 because she still has an event later on in the week,” UW assistant coach Quincy Howe said. “We kind of sacrificed today’s performance for the betterment of her high jump on Saturday.”

By the time all was said and done, Menlove took the heptathlon championship with 5,325 points, over 2,000 more than Jackson’s 3,235.

With this year’s heptathlon season complete, Howe said the offseason will be used to focus on Jackson’s throws, specifically in the shot put and javelin events. On the other hand, Jackson said she also feels she needs to work on long distance running and conditioning.

Howe said, “Next year, I believe Britney can get to 4,700 points in the heptathlon, which will probably be top six in the conference."

Although the heptathlon is complete, Jackson will still compete in the women’s high jump. The event will take place at noon on Saturday.

“I’m really going to try and make the regional mark in the event and just jump as high as I can,” she said.