MEDAL COUNT: Princeton High boys’ track star Yi-Tian Xiong displays the medal he earned for taking second in the 55-meter hurdles at the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association (NJSIAA) North 2 Group 3 indoor sectional meet earlier this month. Last Saturday, Xiong placed fourth in the 55 hurdles at the Group 3 state championship meet as PHS finished 22nd in the team standings at the event (Photo provided by Trey Carnevale)
By Justin Feil
Yi-Tian Xiong medaled for the first time at the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association (NJSIAA) Group 3 indoor state championships in the boys’ 55-meter hurdles on Saturday, a comeback of sorts for the Princeton High junior.
Xiong placed fourth in 7.70 seconds. The top three finishers at each group meet advance automatically to the NJSIAA Meet of Champions, plus the next 12 top finishers across all groups. Xiong is the top alternate after Group 2 and 3 and Non-Public A and B finished and is likely to advance to his first indoor MOC with just Groups 1 and 4 left to compete.
“It’d mean a lot just to show that you’re able to come back and do all these great things this year,” said Xiong, one of 10 PHS athletes to compete at the Group 3 meet.
The five hurdles on the track weren’t the only ones Xiong has had to navigate. This winter has been plagued by inclement weather that has forced the Tiger team to train exclusively indoors at times, spending more time running in the hallways and weight lifting than in normal years. They have the bonus of training at Princeton University once per week, which has been some of the only times Xiong has been able to train going over actual hurdles.
“With the conditions of this winter, it’s been really hard to keep training at a particular level when certain things are restricted by the weather being too cold to even go outside, and when snow comes around,” said PHS first-year head coach Trey Carnevale. “Kids are running the hallways, and we can’t really do much with hurdles and stuff, so we’ve really had to take a really different approach when it came to certain days of training this year.”
It’s also the first time that Xiong has hurdled an entire indoor track and field season. As a freshman, he spent most of his time in sprints in the winter, and then last year his winter season was cut short when he fractured his wrist in a fall at the Colonial Valley Conference Championships (CVC) when an opponent’s fallen hurdle sent him tumbling, a misfortune that cost him the remainder of indoor season and could have created a mental hurdle.
“I feel like that made me want to come back even stronger,” said Xiong. “I feel like that was sort of a sense of motivation, like I wasn’t able to do well at counties indoor last year because of that. So that made me want to come back and just have a really good indoor and outdoor season this year.”
Xiong has. It began last spring when he placed second at the outdoor CVC Championships and then sixth at the Group 4 Central Jersey sectional to advance to the Group 4 state meet. It was enough to send him into this winter with high hopes. The winter helped raise his hopes when he again finished second at the CVC Championships, placed second at the Central Jersey 3 sectional and recorded a personal-record 7.59 seconds at the Garden State Invitational in the lead-up to groups.
“Because last year I also made the group meet, it was kind of my expectation that I’m able to compete at this level and I want to be better than what I was doing before,” said Xiong. “And this year I would say I was more confident going into the group meet and I think that’s why I was able to come away with the medal this time.”
It wasn’t without another obstacle. In the preliminary qualifying round, Xiong was hit by the competitor next to him, and his time of 7.89 seconds was his second slowest recorded of the entire season. He had to play the waiting game to get another shot in the finals.
“I was in seventh place going into the final so that was a little stressful just watching the other heat, seeing if I could get into the final,” said Xiong. “And then in the final, finishing fourth and just being in a good place to hopefully qualify for the Meet of Champs, that was something that was obviously positive and exciting for me because of what happened in the prelims.”
Princeton is also hopeful that Kajol Karra might advance to the MOC. The Tiger senior distance running star and Tufts University commit placed in two events, taking fifth in the girls’ 3,200 meters in 10:48.20 and sixth in the girls’ 1,600 meters in 5:14.21.
“She’s just such a great individual to have on the team and I talk to her all the time — we’re gonna miss her tremendously and I’m just trying to take in as much as I can with her being on the team,” said Carnevale.
“I know the other coaches can speak of that as well because we’re not good at goodbyes sometimes and she’s gonna be missed tremendously. It’s just another moment for Kajol there and we’re just super proud of her.”
For the PHS girls, Grace Hegedus was seventh in the 1,600 meters and 10th in the 3,200 which gives her a chance to reach the MOC as well. Indoor CVC champion Lena Murray was 20th in the 800, Maddie Hamlin was 20th and Simone Henriques was 23rd in the 55-meter dash. The 4×400 relay took 16th place. In addition to Xiong, the boys had Saboor Qureshi place 10th in the 3,200 meters.
“I think it was the first time since 2022 that we had this many kids at that group meet,” said Carnevale. “So really, really awesome to see that. Each year, we have younger individuals, like Simone Henriques, making her first group meet. And as we kind of keep moving on up, we get more and more representation there. I think we’re just starting to figure things out as a whole training cohort across our entire team, from distance to sprints, and we’re just trying to do our best to make sure we get as much representation there.”
Xiong already has come a long way from his simple start. He was in eighth grade when he took up track, and originally he was a jumper. But as the season went along, he gravitated to hurdles.
“Actually, some of my teammates started beating me in the jumps,” said Xiong. “So I tried to find a new event that I could be the best at.”
It was a perfect fit. Xiong has some strength and flexibility from practicing taekwondo and kung fu in the past. He still has the explosion of a jumper that helps him excel in the shorter sprint hurdles that are his favorite, but he also competes in the longer 400 hurdles for team points and has run on the Tigers’ 4×400 relays and served as an alternate for their 4×100 relays. The PHS boys don’t have any other hurdlers at the moment, but he’s become an experienced leader in drills and workouts for the girls and will continue to be a strong role model.
“He’s just one of those guys, he’s so humble and he’s such a great coachable athlete and shows up every day, does the work, always is asking for the little things,” said Carnevale. “And he’s also just very mindful of the things he needs to change in himself as well. He’s a really great student in the sport. And I think it’s been indicative of his performances this year.”
Xiong has come back through everything to compete at a higher level in his third year of hurdling. He’s been consistently lower with his times in the winter to set him up for a big finish to the season. He expects to compete at the MOC and then he’ll finish the winter with indoor nationals in Boston.
“I definitely want to come away with another personal best,” said Xiong. “I know the competition at meetup chance in nationals will be super intense, so I can’t always count on placing or getting a medal. So definitely just improving on my own times.”
The Tigers have been building through the winter, and though the weather hardly seems much better following Sunday’s storm, spring will be here soon. Xiong anticipates Princeton adding some athletes into the mix and sees a lot of potential in his team for the spring season.
“I definitely think that we’re getting a lot stronger because of our focus in the weight room and we’ve been introducing some new drills like the drills on the ladders, which helps with our central nervous system and getting fast feet,” said Xiong. “So I think we’ll be really good this season because this year they talked about using indoor as a like a stepping stone towards outdoors. So I think we’ll be strong outdoors and I’m excited for that.”
Xiong will take the lead in the hurdles for PHS. He has developed into a standout hurdler in a little over three years of competing. He’s doing all he can to keep progressing and to one day run in college.
“He’s dealt with these roadblocks here and there, but he’s never once gotten frustrated about it or he’s never once blamed himself for anything,” said Carnevale. “He’s always just such a great kid to coach. And I’m very, very excited to see what his spring looks like, and then to have him for a whole other year. I mean, the way he’s progressing right now, the sky’s the limit for him.”