Edison High School’s track and field team participated in two major meets, the Ocean Breeze Invitational and the Ocean Breeze Elite Invitational. In both competitions, our athletes performed exceptionally well in almost every event.

The first invitational, Ocean Breeze Invitational, featured several brilliant performances by a wide variety of track and field athletes.

Bryce Hickerson ’26 ran a time of 1:59:04 minutes in the 800-meter run finals, placing ninth overall. Alongside him and the relay team, there were also many great running performances.

Tanush Lingala ‘27 had a particularly great performance in the sophomore 800-meter finals, finishing sixth place with a time of 2:04.43 minutes. In addition to Lingala, Kwadwo Boateng ‘27, another sophomore, placed second in the sophomore 55-meter hurdles finals, and hit a school record-breaking 43-9.25 feet triple jump. The performances by these two sophomores were especially notable since they’ve already placed high, as well as having medaled by only the second year of their high school track and field careers.

The high jump was another event that our track and field team performed exceptionally well in. Ama Boateng ’25 debuted with a 5 feet 4 inches high jump, which placed her in third place overall for the girls’ high jump finals. This impressive feat by Boateng also set a new school record. David Brown ’25, one of the best high jumpers in the state, achieved third overall in the high jump finals with a jump of 6 feet and 4 inches.

Additionally, the 4×200-meter team had one of the biggest victories. Not only did the team win the division, but their time of 1:30.5 also broke the school record by 3 seconds. The 4 runners were Brock Brunson ’25, Brown, Joseph Pinheiro ‘25, and their captain, Moustafa Abdelaal ‘25. Brunson, one of these 4×200 meter members, also ran a 6.79 second 55-meter dash time, which placed him fifth overall in the 55-meter dash finals.

“It was so nice seeing everyone race at Ocean Breeze Invitational, even though we were there from 8 am until 9 pm. There were so many standouts, but one that stood out was Lingala’s 2:04 which was over an 11-second PR. I’ve never seen anything like it before and it’s only the beginning. One of my favorite moments was breaking the 4x200m school record by over 3 seconds, getting first overall and winning our heat by over 4 seconds,” said Captain Abdelaal.

The successes found at this meet have carried a momentum that has brought the track team even more success in recent times. Prominently, the entire 4×200 team qualified for the New Balance National event for the third time yet. Ocean Breeze Invitational also set up amazing performances at the Ocean Breeze Elite Invitational. Brown and Emmanuel Akinbo ‘25 had particularly great performances there and respectively achieved first and second place in the boys high jump finals with 6 feet 6-inch jumps. Boateng notably achieved first place in the girls high jump finals, with a 5 feet 4 inches high jump mark.

The captains also had a lot to say about the Ocean Breeze Elite Invitational and the performances that took place.

“Ocean Breeze Elite went very well. It was the end of the season so all our athletes were at their peaks and got many PRs, medals, and records. We had 2 school records broken in the 60m dash by Brock Brunson and the 60m Hurdles by me as well as qualifying me for nationals. We had athletes medal in the 4x200m relay (Brunson, Abdelaal, Ahmed, Pinheiro) Hurdles (Pinheiro), High Jump (Brown, Boateng, and Akinbo), and Triple jump (Boateng). We also had 2 athletes win 1st place in their events with David Brown and Ama Boateng in high jump. Emmanuel Akinbo also placed 2nd in the high jump with a huge PR going from 6-2 to 6-6. Overall it was a great meet especially for the end of the season,” said Captain Pinheiro.

Emmanuel Akinbo ‘25 was especially proud of his performance, considering that his new “6-6 PR got me ranked 5th in the state and 66th in the country.”

The EHS track and field team remarkably had outstanding performances at both the Ocean Breeze Invitational and Elite Invitational, with more to come as our athletes continue to excel in the current spring season. Led by Captains Abdelaal and Pinheiro, the team has already found success, with many more opportunities to continually improve and outperform themselves as the new season progresses.