Crowd inspires Garnet Valley’s Coaxum to gold in long jump

CALN — His back ailing, the clock ticking, Garnet Valley senior Larry Coaxum went all-in on what would be his second and final long jump Saturday at the District 1 Class 3A Track & Field championships.

That included taking the suggestion of Jaguars jumping coach Lori Belinsky to clap his hands high over his head just as some of the greats have done to draw energy from the crowd after working it into a frenzy.

“It got my adrenaline pumping,” said Coaxum, who had qualified for states in the triple jump. “I don’t normally do that. But my back was hurting a lot so we just decided to go all out and if I didn’t make it, I’d stop. I just gave it everything I had.”

Coaxum laid out for a personal best 23-foot jump to win the competition by almost two feet. Here’s something else to clap about. The gold sparked Garnet Valley to seventh place in the team competition with 26 points.

That topped the Delco schools in the competition, as Penn Wood was next with 21 points followed by Haverford (19), Upper Darby (16), Ridley (14), Radnor (12), Chichester (5), Penncrest (4) and Strath Haven (2).

The Jaguars spent a chunk of the afternoon on the podium and qualifying for states.

Sean Garrett reached states finishing fourth in the 1,600 in 4:24.28 behind his friend Aiden Tomov of Haverford, who was second in 4:21.94.

Eric Albright of Garnet Valley clocked a state qualifying 1:55.79 to take fifth place in the 800, where Radnor teammates Ethan Zeh (1:55.31) and Luke O’Malley (1:56.81) also got in, finishing fourth and sixth, respectively.

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