Noble, Toussaint head east

Local track phenoms, Rogers graduate Rebekah (Becca) Noble and West Valley grad Rashad Toussaint, take their acts to Windsor, Ontario, this weekend as members of team USA for the Pan American Junior Athletic Championships.

Noble, Washington state’s all-time fastest high school 800-meter runner at 2 minutes, 3.73 seconds, will compete in her specialty beginning with Friday’s semifinals. The finals are Saturday.

Toussaint, who triple jumped to the head of Washington’s prep class with a best of 52 feet, one-half inch, competes on Sunday.

The Juniors begin Thursday with opening ceremonies and will feature athletes from the United States, Canada, Mexico, Central and South America and the Caribbean.

Noble’s best time is .03 seconds off the meet record, set by Mairelin Fuentes of Mexico in 1997. The Pan American Junior record is 2:00.07 by Kim Gallagher of the USA in 1982 and the World Junior (age 19 and younger) mark is 1:57.18, established in 1993 by Yuan Wang of China.

Noble is seeded first, ahead of teammate Heidi Magill, a Brigham Young University freshman who ran 2:04.99 to finish second to Noble at the U.S. Junior Track and Field Championships last month in California.

It was there a couple of days later that Toussaint made his epic leap on his final attempt to qualify second for the Pan-Am games.

He is seeded sixth in the field, some 3 feet behind top-ranked Denny Fernandez Deraliz of Cuba.

Deraliz has an entry mark of 16.91 meters (approximately 55-6), which exceeds the current meet record. The Pan-Am junior record is 17.4m (57-1) by Pedro Perez Duenas of Cuba in 1971, 4 inches less than the world record set in 1985 by Volker Mai of Germany.