The 2019 staging of the ISSA/GraceKennedy Boys and Girls’ Athletics Championships will forever be etched in the mind of Kingston College’s star athlete Wayne Pinnock.
On March 27, 2019 – day two of the five-day championships – Pinnock finally registered a legal jump over eight metres to break the Boys’ Class 1 long jump record at the National Stadium.
Pinnock broke the record twice in the final with successive jumps on his way to register a big personal best.
In doing so, Pinnock became the first athlete to break the eight-metre mark in the long jump at Champs.
Firstly, Pinnock soared 7.95m to erase Vere Technical’s Leon Gordon’s 26-year-old record with his second attempt and then improved on the mark with a massive 8.05m effort.
Pinnock had soared over the eight-metre mark twice that season but those efforts were helped by winds over the legal limit.
Pinnock also won two other gold medals to help KC dethroned seven-time defending champion Calabar High and took their first title since 2009 and 32 overall.
One of those other two gold medals also came in record time. After leaping the record 8.05m in the long jump, Pinnock returned the next day to face a crack field of hurdlers, including the Champs record holder, Dejour Russell of Calabar.
Pinnock clocked a stunning 13.06 seconds to break Russell’s 2018 record of 13.10, finishing ahead of teammate Akeem Cargill, 13.28, and Rasheed Broadbell of St Jago High, 13.33.
