Jackie Coward runs away with 60-meter hurdle record

	Jackie Coward sprinted into the record books with a national-record time of 8.29 seconds in the 60-meter hurdles. Courtesy of Charles Ryan

Each week SI.com will select the athlete who displays excellence on and off the field as the Primetime Performer.

Jackie Coward, 5-foot-7, 130, Jr., Hurdles, West High (Knoxville, Tenn.)

Jackie Coward has always been light on her toes, but now she is dancing to a new tune, namely the national record of 8.29 seconds in the 60-meter hurdles that she set at the Niswonger Invitational at East Tennessee State.

"I don't know how I did it," Coward says. "My heart was just [racing]. I got nervous, but I did what I had to do. I didn't believe my coach at first. I was happy, but I was just humble about it."

A junior at West High (Knoxville, Tenn.), Coward arrived late -- just 20 minutes before her heat -- and did not have enough time to properly warm up. But she breezed through the race; the runner-up in her heat was far behind with a time of 8.78. The previous record of 8.33 was shared by three girls. Even though 60 of the 65 entries in her event were collegians, Coward won the title on Saturday in 8.35.

"Adrenaline will do that for you," says Chuck Ryan, who along with Tyangela Sanders coaches Coward's AAU team, Track Knoxville. Coward ran under the AAU team's banner for the record because her high school team does not have a winter season. Coward said that she is suddenly far ahead of the schedule her coach had set for her at the beginning of the indoor season.

"It did surprise me," she says, "I wanted to set the record at the end of the season. That kind of scared me."

Ryan was also surprised. "For her to do it so early in the season is phenomenal," he says. "She is completely oblivious to everything she accomplishes. She has no clue. I wish she was more excitable."

Coward, who has run age-group track since elementary school, has blossomed since entering West High where she was state champion in the 100-meter hurdles as a freshman. She really dominated as a sophomore, however, winning state titles in four events (100-, 200- and 400-meter dashes and the 100-meter hurdles). She scored over half of the Rebels' team points while leading them to their first-ever state championship. Counting the qualifying heats, she had to run eight races in two days.

What will she do for an encore?

"It's just me competing against myself," she says. "I'll just keep working to get better. I would like to make the Pan American team and break the 100-meter hurdles record (12.95). I'd like my team to win the state meet again."