Ath­lete of the Week: Thomas Jack­son

MISHAWAKA—Se­nior Thomas Jack­son kicked off the 2021 In­door Track & Field sea­son in an ex­plo­sive way. How­ever, this did not mean the start of the sea­son was easy. Like every­one else, COVID-19 proved to be an ob­sta­cle. 

“It’s been dif­fer­ent,” said Jack­son. “Even though I still in­ter­act with my team­mates, it’s not like it has been in the past. With the so­cial dis­tanc­ing and hav­ing to wear a mask, it took me a bit to get ac­cli­mated with the fresh­man.” 

Last sea­son, Jack­son was named an In­door All-Amer­i­can, as well as an In­door Ath­lete of the Meet at the NC­CAA Na­tional Cham­pi­onships. This year, he has been named the Cross­roads League Ath­lete of the Week and the NAIA Na­tional In­door Ath­lete of the Week. He also had the op­por­tu­nity in 2018 to com­pete for a spot on the USA Track & Field Ju­nior Out­door Cham­pi­onships. 

“It means a lot,” said Jack­son, “It’s a small goal that will lead to a big­ger goal, but every achieve­ment, ac­knowl­edge­ment, and award that I get is a bless­ing.” 

This sea­son, the Pi­lots com­peted at the IWU In­vi­ta­tional where Jack­son had two NAIA stan­dards and three NC­CAA stan­dards. His NAIA stan­dards came in Long Jump, tak­ing first with a mark of 7.48m, and Triple Jump, tak­ing sec­ond with a mark of 14.10m. His NAIA stan­dards came in the Long Jump, the Triple Jump, and the 60m. He placed third in the 60m with a time of 7.01 sec­onds. 

As far as the rest of this sea­son, the Bethel Men’s Track and Field team has a short­ened in­door sea­son with two meets left un­til the Cross­roads League Cham­pi­onship and then the NAIA Na­tional Cham­pi­onship. 

“Bring­ing a na­tional cham­pi­onship back to the school, both in­di­vid­u­ally and as a team, is def­i­nitely a goal for me and my team­mates” said Jack­son. 

Bethel has yet to com­pile a sched­ule for their out­door sea­son, but for up­dates on that visit www.bupi­lots.com.  

As a se­nior, Jack­son plans to grad­u­ate from Bethel this spring with a ma­jor in Sports Stud­ies.  

“Hope­fully I can qual­ify for the Olympic tri­als and con­tinue my track and field ca­reer,” said Jack­son. “I want to con­tinue to keep run­ning and jump­ing and be­ing a pos­i­tive role model for those that do not have that per­son in their life. For me, I had dif­fer­ent peo­ple that told me dif­fer­ent things, and I just want to make sure that those in­di­vid­u­als can get to where they want to go.” 

The Men’s In­door Track and Field team will com­pete next on Feb. 5 at the IWU Mid­west Clas­sic.