Kaua‘i grad and current University of Hawai‘i at Manoa freshman Jamilee Jimenez made the finals of two of the four events she competed in at the Western Athletic Conference Championships which concluded on Saturday in Boise, Idaho. She and the
Kaua‘i grad and current University of Hawai‘i at Manoa freshman Jamilee Jimenez made the finals of two of the four events she competed in at the Western Athletic Conference Championships which concluded on Saturday in Boise, Idaho.
She and the Hawai‘i track and field team finished fifth overall and multi-event specialist Annett Wichman was named the Co-Outstanding Field Performer after scoring in all five events she was entered in.
Jimenez competed in the 60 Meter Dash and the 200 Meter Dash where she was eliminated in the preliminaries, but made the finals in the long and triple jumps. In the long jump final on Saturday, Jimenez tied for 10th place with her teammate Emily Sheppard with jumps of 17-feet-7 inches. In the triple jump, she finished in 14th with a distance of 35-feet-11 1/4 inches.
Louisiana Tech captured the women’s title for the second consecutive year edging Idaho 120 to 114. Host Boise State finished third (112) followed by Utah State (92.5), Hawai‘i (72.5), Nevada (57), Fresno State (48), and New Mexico State (47).
During the three-day competition, Wichmann captured two medals adding a bronze medal in the triple jump on Saturday after winning the pentathlon for the third straight year on Thursday. Hawai‘i also won silver in the triple as Sheppard jumped 39-feet-2 1/4. Wichmann won bronze with a mark of 38-feet-8 3/4.
Wichmann scored 25 total points in five events. Also on Saturday, Wichman placed fifth in the shot put with a heave of 46-feet, 3/4 inches. On Friday, she placed sixth in the high jump and seventh in the long jump. Wichmann shared the top performer award with Boise State’s Eleni Kafourou who won gold in the long jump and triple jump.
On Friday, Hawai‘i swept the high jump event 1-2-3. Amber Kaufman captured the gold medal with a jump of 5-feet-9 1/4 to beat teammate Sarah Saddleton, who also cleared the same height but finished second due to the tiebreaker. Sheppard, last year’s high jump gold medalist, finished in third with a height of 5-foot-8 inches.
This was Jimenez’s first ever WAC Championships. The rookie started of the year strongly, setting a new school record in the 60 Meter Dash with a time of 7.93 in her heat at the Lumberjack Invitational in Arizona. She went from competing in two events to competing in four at the championships.
