SACRAMENTO, CA -- If there is one thing that Sacramento Charter High School 400 meter Hurdles gold medalist Tori Mason will take away from her win at the Region 14 USA Track and Field Junior Olympic Top 3 Championships held in Bakersfield, California on 10-12 July, 2009 is how blessed she is to have qualified as a first-time competitor at the USATF National JO Championships to be held in Greensboro, North Carolina.

Mason states, I'm very excited about making the trip to the East Coast because I have family that lives there. We prayed that I would get the chance to compete at National JO's, and I made it."

Mason has been only competing in track and field since February 2009, but because of a great work ethic she has had a very successful postseason.  She was crowned the gold medal 300 meter Hurdles champion at the adidas 50th Anniversary Golden West Invitational.  And now she, the 16 year-old, is finishing her postseason as a competitor at National JO's in the Intermediate Girls division running both the 100 meter and 400m Hurdles on 01-02 August 2009.

Her coaches know that she plans to win all her races, and that she is very confident in her ability to make it happen.  So much so, Mason has improved her 400m Hurdle winning time from 1:09.75, a victory she earned at the Pacific Association Top 8 JO Championships, to a 1:08.25 first place win at the Region 14 USATF Top 3 competition.

And Mason  states, “I’m going to National JO's to run faster times, meet other athletes from across the USA, stay injury-free, win gold, and have fun with my family."  She continues, "My coaches have trained me to work on the tactical aspects of my race, to visualize it, to trust the practice training plans that they wrote for me, and to let winning take care of itself.  All this has helped me to relax, to become a champion that wants to win gold, and hopefully I will earn All-American honors at this, my first-ever, National JO Championships.”