Three former Country of Cornwall Athletic Association (COCAA) Western Champs winners, Nia Robinson, Tyrese Reid and Courtney Lawrence, are the leaders in their respective events in the National Junior College Athletics Association (NJCAA) Indoors season which got underway recently.

Robinson, formerly of Rusea’s High and a freshman at Barton County College in Kansas, leads the women’s triple jump; Reid, formerly of Spot Valley High and now a sophomore at Barton County, leads in the 600 yards and the 100m, while Lawrence, who attended Petersfield High and now represents Cloud County Community College, is in front in the men’s shot put.

Additionally, Daniel Cope, also of Petersfield and now at Cloud County, also in Kansas, is second in the weight throw. Reid and Lawrence were rewarded for their good starts. Reid was named the Kansas Jayhawk Community College Conference (KJCCC) Field Athlete of the Week for her double win at the Coffeyville Invite two weeks ago, while Lawrence was the United States Track and Field Cross Country Coaches Association NJCAA Track Athlete of the Week for his performance at the Highland Challenge on Saturday, January 16.

Meanwhile, in the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), former Mt Alvernia High sprinter Soyinne Greynion, who is now attending Indiana Tech, is third overall in the 60m with a college best 7.64 seconds and ninth in the 200m with 25.50 seconds.

On Saturday, Robinson, who is also third overall in the high and long jump events, extended her dominance at the top of the triple jump rankings with a massive new lifetime best 12.58m to place third at the Red Raider Invitational at Texas Tech.

Competing against NCAA level athletes, Robinson led the triple jump for a long time but was eventually passed by two seniors from Texas Tech.

Her mark was however almost a full metre better than the 11.66m she did at Coffeyville and was the seventh best ever at Barton and would have placed the freshman in the top 15 of the NCAA Division 1 ranking.

Later in the day she finished ninth in the high jump, her first in college, clearing 1.63m in the high jump, an automatic qualifier for the national championships.

Reid ran a personal best of 1 minute 19.67 seconds for fourth place in the 600 yards and placed third in the 1000m with 2 minutes 37.62 seconds, both tops in the Junior College rankings.

He has also qualified for both events at the national championships set for later this year.

Lawrence, who was the high school boys shot put champion at the 2019 Penn Relays, improved his lead in the shot put event with a massive personal best 18.48m, also the school record, at the Highland Challenge on  January 15 and has gone over 18.00m this season, after passing the mark just once last year.

Daniel Cope, who was the Jamaican men’s team captain to the World Athletics Under-18 championships in Nairobi, Kenya in 2017, broke the Cloud County school record in the weight throw with 18.02m at the Washburn All Kansas Invite on Saturday, second best overall in the NJCAA.