John Padula wasn’t sure how John Thomas was going to run in the 300 meters after he finished winning the 55-meter dash. It was a transition the Sheepshead Bay senior was not used to as former teammate Ayo Isijola ran the race for the Sharks the last two seasons. Thomas pleaded with his coach for a chance.
“He didn’t want me to run it and I am like, ‘Please, please, please.’ He finally let me run it,” Thomas said.
He won the race in a time of 6.40, beating out Midwood’s Donald Willams by one-one hundredth of a second and setting the meet record at the Bishop Loughlin games at The Armory last Saturday. Unlike Padula, Thomas had confidence in his encore in the 300.
“I knew I could run a 33,” he said. “I did it last year. I was expecting to come back and run a 33 this year or an even faster time.”
Thomas won the race in a time of 33.95 and led from start to finish. The time is the fastest in the country in the early indoor season by nearly a full second and a half. Dale McDonald of Roosevelt in Yonkers was second in 34.40.
Thomas hopes to break the national record of 33.2, according to Padula. The coach believes he will need to run Thomas against top competition for him to be pushed toward that mark. He finished second in the 300 at the indoor state championships last season with a time of 34.96. Teammate Rolyce Boston won the long jump with a leap of 22 feet, nine inches at the Loughlin Games.
“To PR in the first meet and after running the 55 also was pretty exceptional,” Padula said. %u2026 “Usually when we run a lot of rounds of sprints it takes a lot out of your legs. Early in the season you are not prepared for that.”
All of this is in preparation of running Thomas in the 400 hurdles in the outdoor season. Thomas hurdled in his native Jamaica, before coming to the U.S. at the age of 15. Padula feels it is the best event for him going forward into college and beyond. Thomas will likely have to attend a junior college, because credits from Jamaica will leave him short of core classes, but he is getting a bevy of Division I interest.
“With his ability to hurdle and his tremendous amount of speed he could not just make an Olympic team, but he could win an Olympic medal,” Padula said. “That’s the kind of talent he has.”
Bishop Loughlin Games notes: Monsignor Farrell’s Cory Duggan won the pole vault with a leap of 15-feet and O’Neil Sandiford of Robeson placed first in the high jump (6-08). Medgar Evers won the 4 x 200 relay in a time of 1:30.90 and Midwood won the 4 x 400 relay in 3:28.62.
