Nadia goes ‘home’ to coach

WHEN NADIA Alexander-Pompey left St Hugh’s High School with her 2004 Penn Relays shot put winner’s medal packed, she landed at Louisiana Tech University. Earlier this week, she returned to her collegiate home as associate head coach. It’s a return she had long dreamt of.

“It’s a surreal feeling. It’s something you spent many years envisioning, hoping it would happen, you know, not quite sure when or how it would happen. But now it’s happening, you just try to live in the moment,” said the former Manning’s School and St Hugh’s star during a break from unpacking in Louisiana.

Alexander-Pompey has amassed a wealth of coaching experience since her days as a record-breaking shot putter on the university’s Ruston campus. She spent the last two years as head coach at Florida A&M University, having previously served as head coach at Mississippi Valley State and Shaw University, and as assistant coach at Lincoln University and Virginia State University.

Now 35, Alexander-Pompey plans to start her work at Rushton by rebuilding LaTech’s tradition in the throws.

That movement saw the likes of Jason Morgan, Olivia McKoy, Robert Holdsworth, Micara Vassell, Melissa Gibbons and Brenda Grace-Hunt come to the fore.

“Of course, we want to reopen that pipeline with the Jamaicans; and not just the Jamaicans, the Caribbean,” she replied.

SHOT PUT RECORD HOLDER

She still holds the LaTech indoor and outdoor shot put records at 16.34 metres and 16.68 metres, respectively, with the latter result giving her a collegiate victory at the 2009 Penn Relays.

Grace-Hunt, a former Wolmerian, holds the javelin record at 56.89 metres. Notably, Morgan and McKoy went on to become Olympians in the discus and javelin, respectively. Both won bronze medals at the Commonwealth Games; Morgan in 2014 and McKoy in 2006.

“We’re trying to rebuild the programme back to prominence because during my years, there was probably a 10-year or so stretch when we always had somebody at Nationals for the throws. So, you know, (we are) trying to see if we can elevate the programme back to that level,” said the woman who was a National Collegiate Athletic Association shot put finalist in 2009.

She followed that accomplishment with a place in the 2010 Commonwealth Games final and will draw on her experience as both athlete and coach in Louisiana.

“I was good enough to make it to Nationals and I was kind of comfortable. So that’s the biggest thing I try to get my athletes to know first, don’t sell yourselves short,” she declared.

“Don’t just settle,” Alexander-Pompey underlined, “because, in your mind, you think you’ve made it.”

She began her new job on Monday, November 2.