New York, USA (SMS) — For a while she had been known as ‘The Closer’, and for good reason.
Now, Kadecia Baird’s moniker in US junior track circles is fast cross-fading to ‘The Finisher’, and the validation is even better.
The young Guyana-born track phenom polished that transition on her dub with a glistening win in the girls’ 400m at the 2012 New Balance National Scholastic Outdoor Championships in Greensboro, North Carolina earlier this month.
The student-athlete from New York’s Medgar Evers Prep H.S. blazed to an eye-popping 52.14s in the sectional-run 400m to show her world-class talent.
A personal best (PR) for Baird, the mark gives her the 2012 top ranking in the US and the #8 rank all-time for US high schoolers. More importantly, the time also gives an Olympic ‘B’ qualification to the 17-year old who should be lacing up for the IAAF World Junior Championships, next month, as well.
But, the showing did not faze the sprint ace who carries an ostensible outlook on herself. “After seeing the time, I was initially upset because I wanted to go and run, like, 51-point. But, I ‘PRed’ and I came out on top as a national champion, so that was something special.”
Coach Shaun Dietz, too, thought it was exceptional.
“For Kadecia going out this year and breaking all those records and then becoming a national champion is surely a source of tremendous pride to her school and the New York and Guyanese communities,” the Jamaica-born Dietz emphasized to Stabroek Sports after the event.
With her 2012 season encasing new records in all her flat races, plus 4x200m, 4x400m and the SMR at boro, city, state and other meets, Baird was on a collision course with Kyle Plante, the pre-race favourite.
After earlier dropping an astounding 23.26s (3.5m/s) in the girls’ 200m preliminaries, Baird effectively burnt the challenge out of her fellow New Yorker’s psyche as she put space between herself and her runner-up (53.32s)
“After running the 200 prelims and I ran my personal best, I know all I had to do for the 400 was to have confidence and go out there and run, because running the 200m in 23-2 just sent a shock wave to everybody and that probably told them I was going to come with something great in the 400 final.”
Like rising from 220 to 440, the volts stunned Dietz.
“The plan was for her to be aggressive early and then stay in contention for her good top end speed. However, she was somewhat behind the girls after the first half, then she turned on the finishing speed to close it out by metres. She is truly a talent.”
Running in three sections with the first two at 4:10pm and the third three hours later, the 400m had seven of the top eight coming from Baird’s latter race.
New Jersey’s Olivia Baker (54.83s), North Carolina’s Ariah Graham (55.04s) and Kendall Ellis (55.15s) of Florida, occupied the other high placings.
The Guyanese lass was just a 10th of a second outside of the meet record of 52.04s done in 2006 by American star quarter-miler Jessica Beard, a world championship mile relay gold medalist.
Baird’s performance prompts fellow Guyanese and 1996 Olympian Nicola Martial to state that “Guyana’s got talent … and Baird epitomizes this notion” on a promo flyer for the Medgar Evers Prep junior. “(Baird) is one of the fastest female high school sprinters in the United States and is currently ranked #5 in the world on the IAAF World Juniors list”, the colorful handbill continues. It lists Baird’s meteoric rise, and calls for support to help her “realize her goals of competing for Guyana.”
The tall, Pisces intends to keep in stride preparing for the immediate challenges of the world juniors in Barcelona, Spain from July 10 to 15. “I am looking forward to going out there and have some fun making it to the final and hoping to make the top three in both events,” the soft spoken Baird said about her 200m and 400m entries.
For Baird, that will be closing a superlative season with finishes that add to her regard as an awesome anchor-leg on top relay teams, and now her ability to execute in flat races to be a champion.
