Romero finishes seventh at U.S. Nationals
DES MOINES, Iowa — Former Catholic High, Georgia and Louisiana-Lafayette standout Morgann LeLeux Romero finished tied for seventh place in the pole vault at the 2018 USA Track & Field Outdoor Championships held at Drake University last week.
LeLeux Romero cleared her first two heights at 4.30 meters (14 feet, 1 inch) and 4.45 meters (14-7.25) before failing to clear the bar at 4.55 meters (14-9).
She finished tied with Tori Hoggard for seventh place in the meet, which was won by Sandi Morris, who cleared 4.8 meters (15-9). Second place went to Katie Nageotte (15-5) and third place went to Jenn Suhr (15-1).
“We had some challenges over the last three months,” said LeLeux Romero’s track coach Shane Romero. “We kind of shut everything down to work on her technique.
“We had this trip planned and it’s so hard to get out of all these travel plans that we made, so we decided to try out her revamped techniques.”
LeLeux added that these technique changes needed to be made in order for Romero to reach greater heights and that the bad part was that she hadn’t jumped over a bar in two months.
“For her to go out there and clear a bar was a first-place jump for me,” LeLeux said. “She took the changes that we made over the last two months and took them to a runway in a major competition.
“Anytime you get a top 10 finish in a major championship you have to be satisfied. I know Morgann’s not satisfied because she felt she can jump higher but her timing was off because we hadn’t jumped over any bars.”
LeLeux added his daughter plans to jump Saturday in New Heights Gym’s annual Independence Day Vault and then shut down for the remainder of the season to complete work on her new technique with the plan to compete in the 2019 IAAF World Championships in Doha, Qatar in October.