PERFECT FORM: Fallon Rovel-Jones has had her moments of tripping over hurdles, this isn't one of them.
Rovel-Jones won the Baltimore County, Class 1A Central Regional and 1A State title in the 55-meter hurdle during the indoor season.
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There is one thing that you can not tell a sprinter to do and that is slow down. One year ago, Fallon Rovel-Jones missed most of the indoor track season and all of the outdoor with tendonitis and a torn ligament in her left knee.
But the good news is, Rovel-Jones is not just a sprinter, she is also a hurdler, which defines her perfectly. Tendonitis could not stop the New Town senior from jumping over the injury obstacle to have a near-perfect final year and become the female winner of the DigitalSports Applause Scholarship for Baltimore County.
The Applause Scholarship is awarded in the amount of $500 toward the college education of an outstanding senior student-athlete who has exhibited great courage in overcoming adversity in order to make a positive contribution to his or her team.
In 2007-2008, DigitalSports has named 22 Applause Scholarship winners
in the Baltimore area, representing more than $11,000 in scholarship
awards. Winners have come from
Anne Arundel County,
Baltimore City,
Baltimore County and
Howard County
territories, as well as the
Maryland Interscholastic Athletic Association and the
Interscholastic Athletic Association of Maryland.
During her junior season, Rovel-Jones felt something wasn’t quite right with her knee. She was told that she had to take it easy and not overwork her leg to ensure there would be no further damage.
"My coach [Morgan Lisby at New Town] would tell me 'Fallon go sit down or chill out' but of course I wouldn't listen and I ended up hurting my knee a little bit more than I wanted to," said Rovel-Jones of her injury. "I had to sit during the rest of the indoor season toward [Baltimore County] Championships, Regionals and States and I sat out most of my outdoor season."
"What I did this year was let that be my motivation, nothing was going to stop me..."
"I was really upset at first [about sitting out most of her junior year], Rovel-Jones said. "But then when I put it in perspective I realized that it actually was going to make me better for my senior year...I was kind of mad about it but in the end it paid off."
This past winter, after being sidelined for
pretty much her entire junior season, the UMBC-bound hurdler took it
slow, let the knee come along and had an amazing indoor season.
She ran the table in the 55-meter hurdles by winning all of the championship events. Rovel-Jones won the Baltimore County 55-meter hurdles with a 9.02 second time. She then came in first in both the 1A Central Regionals and 1A State Championships in 8.92 and 8.76 seconds respectively.
In the spring, the hurdler kept her string over victories alive and won both the Baltimore County and 1A North Regional titles at Pikesville High School in the 100-meter hurdles with times of 15.76 and 15.36 respectively.
But at Morgan State University last month, Poolesville’s Olivia Durr and one hundredth of a second stood between Rovel-Jones and a clean sweep in the event.
Both Rovel-Jones (14.75 seconds) and Durr (14.74) shattered the old 1A record of 14.86 run by Zoe Hunt from Smithsburg in 2003. It was the first loss for the New Town grad in a championship finals race this year.
"She [Olivia Durr] beat me by the inch of her pony-tail," said Rovel-Jones with a smile.
Despite coming up just short in her final high school race, Fallon Rovel-Jones had to slow down in order to speed up and get back to her championship form. She will now compete in the prestigious Nike High School Outdoor Championships in North Carolina on June 20-21.