The high jump seemed simple enough the way it was first explained to Christina MacNab.
“My coach at Homer Junior High said, ‘Who wants to try high jump? All you have to do is run at the bar and jump,”’ MacNab said.
“I said, ‘I’ll try it out.’ I started getting good at it. I was like, ‘This is kind of a fun event.’ I stuck with it the rest of the year.”
More Top Picks Best Tortilla Presses For Homemade Tortillas
Four years later, the Providence senior has become one of the best high jumpers in the state. MacNab was Class 2A runner-up last year with a school-record jump of 5 feet, 7 inches.
Springfield Southeast’s Jamari Drake won the 2A tiebreaker over MacNab in a jump-off on fewer misses.
The only individual to go higher at state was Lyons’ Emma Haugen, the three-time 3A champion who cleared 5-9.
It was a comeback year for MacNab after she missed her sophomore outdoor season because of a stress fracture in her left foot. She was seventh in Class 2A as a freshman, jumping 5-3.
“She’s been outstanding since she came in as a freshman,” Providence coach Tom Lenahan said.
MacNab said at first she was a little scared about coming back from the foot injury, but she overcame those fears and twice cleared 5-6 during the outdoor season.
“The track team at Providence, we’re all best friends,” she said. “They were probably my biggest support system. They helped me get through it all.”
The Iowa recruit cleared 5-5 on April 14 to win the Lemont Invitational, then went 5-4 to finish second during Friday’s Chris Marszalek Invitational at Lockport.
“Every day I go to practice, the goal is just to be better at my approach and my steps than the day before,” she said.
“When you get into the higher heights, that’s when everything counts — your steps, your speed. You need to make sure that you have the even speed, that you don’t change anything.”
Other key contributors for the Celtics are sprinters Melanie Olson and Katie Cummings, pole vaulters Gianna Lullo and Stefannie Sestak and Audrey Cunningham in the relays and long jump.
Staying on top: Senior Asia Brown believes strong leadership plays an important role for three-time defending Class 3A champion Lincoln-Way East.
“You have to have leaders on the team to keep everything together, because if something does go bad, you want to nip that in the bud,” Brown said. “We have to show that we’re seniors and step up to the plate because there’s always freshmen, sophomores, juniors and other seniors who are looking up to us.”
The Lincoln-Way East 400-meter relay clocked a state-best 47.24 seconds during Monday’s triangular meet at Joliet Central. Brown led off, followed by Ololade Ayoola, Alexis Pierre-Antoine and Kayla Hylton.
East will head a strong field that includes Bloom and Thornwood at Saturday’s Carol Uhrich Invitational at Thornton.
Keeping track: Saturday’s Distance Night in Palatine turned out to be quite a meet for Sean Torpy. The Sandburg senior clocked a state-best 4:08.64 in the Elite 1,600-meter run.
*The state’s No. 1 ranking in the girls triple jump belongs to Homewood-Flossmoor junior Jaimie Robinson, who leaped 41-0.5 on April 18 at Lincoln-Way East.
*Lockport sophomore John Meyer followed victories in shot put (63-0) and discus (171-10) on April 16 at Homewood-Flossmoor with wins in the shot put (62-5) and discus (179-2) in Friday’s Bob Cohoon Invitational at Downers Grove South.
Tim Tierney is a freelance writer for the Daily Southtown.