Magic Moment: Jordan Rackham's special 1500m run
We turn the clock back to 2013 when Southland runner Jordan Rackham delivered an impressive run to win the New Zealand secondary schools 1500m title.
Southland athletics has produced many magical moments so as part of a new Tribune series we are recalling some of them. Today we turn the clock back to 2013 when Jordan Rackham ran under 4min to win the New Zealand Secondary Schools 1500m title.
The NZSS are probably the hardest championship to win, and the senior 1500m is possibly the hardest event to win.
Winning successive championships, well, rather rare.
In 2013 SBHS’s Jordan Rackham had two objectives - winning the senior boys 1500 and going under four minutes.
Both were rather ambitious. He was ranked only 10th fastest in the field of 14 finalists and had a best time of just 4.07.
It was predicted that the senior 1500 would be one of the best track events of the championships and so it proved, made all the more exciting for Southlanders by Jordan’s astute tactics and turn of speed that made his objectives a reality.
His comment afterwards was “it was set up perfectly for me”. His plan was to sit just behind and outside the leader, and whenever the lead changed he moved up to shadow the new leader. Then at 300m to go he lit the after-burners, taking everyone by surprise, and accelerated to a 5 metre advantage that no one could peg back.
The tactic worked because Jorden was a complete unknow and the field let him go. By the time everyone realised he was serious it was too late.
An anxious glimpse behind half way up the straight told him he had the race won. And his time of 3:58.71, some 1.3 seconds ahead of race favourite Jacob Priddey of Hamilton Boys High.
A year later he was well known and considered the favourite. Most probably considered he wouldn’t use the same tactic of going with 300 to go again. They were wrong. And again, when the field realised it wasn’t a bluff it was too late.
On Friday however, winning, looked doubtful as a stomach bug or bout of food poisoning had him totally washed out. Saturday he was a little better but had to push himself to win his heat.
Sunday morning all signs of stomach problems were gone and he was back to feeling confident. His win in 3:57.57 shows confidence was not misplaced.
Since leaving school in 2014 he gained an athletic scholarship to Nebraska University where he lowed his 1500 time to 3:47.39 (and 3000m to 8.13), graduated with a degree in business then earned a masters from Cornell.
Rackham currently lives in USA.