This is the latest in the series of features honoring the members of our the flrunners.com All-Decade Team. We hope to highlight as many athletes as possible on this list and will hopefully continue to release one per day until the start of cross country regular season.
Career Summary
There seemed to be a resurgence of distance running in Florida starting between 1998 and 2000. Runners like Moise Joseph, Cory Presnick, Mike Swope, Adam Chumbley, Alien Bossmenier, Matt Cianciulli, Rolf Steier, Nico Devries, Daniel Parks... need I go on??.. a huge depth of national caliber runners made it a really crowded place for even the top athletes to shine through. But perhaps there was no two runners more iconic during that period than the Jefferson twins. There was something imposing about seeing these two runners, nearly identical, dressed in green at the front of race after race.
The two often seemed to trade off wins. John Jefferson won most of the big races early on in their career, but later on Sean would come to dominate the longer races while John turned into the mile/800 specialist.
On the cross country course, John showed great promise even as a freshman. On the FCCJ course in Jacksonville, he finished in 8th place that year (1997) with a time of 15:50.20. While that was very respectable time for a freshman of course, it took him only a year to go from good to great. Sophomore year he had cut over 40 seconds from his time and finished in second place to Moise Joseph in 15:07.71. Although he would never taste gold in cross country--there was always Moise Joseph, Mike Swope, or his own brother between him and the tape--he would also never fall below third and cut time every year... 15:04.71 (3rd) as a junior and 15:02.4 (2nd) as a senior..
His finest race in cross country came his senior year when he won the Disney World Classic in October, defeating his brother who was in second place. His time of 14:23.65 for three miles converts impressively to a 14:54 5K. That was the first year that Disney moved their race from the golf course to the Wide World of Sports Complex where it is to this day.
As impressive as that cross country career was, the Jefferson twins really were their best on the track.
Delray Beach Atlantic, during the 2000 and 2001 track seasons were perhaps the greatest relay teams in the history of Florida. Whether it was the 4x800, 4x1600 or the Distance Medley Relay they were simply unbelieveable. The team was anchored by Sean and John Jefferson, Kenny Schappert, and a rotating fourth sometimes Preston Bean or Matt Briganti. The team set the state record in 2001 when they went 7:37.76--two seconds faster than Miami Central's state record performance (to defeat Atlantic) the year before. That state meet John also finished third in the 800 (1:55) and first in the 1600 (4:13.15).
But who can forget the Arcadia Invitational in 2001? This could be the greatest men's high school mile field EVER. The twins were going up against the great Alan Webb and today's top American marathoner Ryan Hall, who at the time was considered a mile specialist. The twins hung on to third and fourth through much of the race, with Webb and Hall leading. Webb dropped a major surge to close the race, putting a hurt on Hall who tried to keep up. The Jefferson boys used the opportunity and blew by Ryan Hall to finish in second and third. John was second in 4:05.52 (4:04.12 1600) and Sean was third in 4:07.25. This was a huge PR of about 7 seconds for John! Webb went 4:01.87, Hall 4:08.37.
Coming off of that race, they still had the Distance Medley to worry about... they would have to battle the other top rated DMR team in the country, that being South Lake, VA anchored by--you guessed it--Alan Webb. The teams had a bit of a rivalry built up already. They battled a month before at Nike Indoors, where they ran the second and third fastest indoor DMR times ever with Atlantic winning 10:03.70 to 10:05.72. But did the Atlantic team really have a shot when their most important legs had just ran well under 4:10? Their other two legs also already had a race under their belts with Kenny Schappert having run a 4:22 mile earlier in the day and Preston Bean ran a 52.67 400.
Sean opened the race for Atlantic with a huge time of 3:03 for the 1200, handing off to Bean with a good lead. Preston held on to the lead with a 50.4 split and gave the stick to Kenny who extended the lead with his 1:55 split. Then it came down to the two anchors: John Jefferson vs. Alan Webb. Webb closed the race with a 4-flat leg!! But Sean, given a 10 second lead by his teammates, just about repeated his earlier mile time to run a 4:06 and hold off Webb. It was the third best time ever in the DMR, 9:57.88! No other Florida team has ever gone under the 10 minute mark... and it may be a while until we ever see it happen again.
But really kudos to John!! A 4:05 and 4:06 in the same day?? Really? Really?!? Really!
Interview
What are most proud of looking back on your high school career?
What I am most proud of when I reflect on my High School career is the way I competed. In high school I was never concerned with my time and where it stood in the standings I just focused on winning. I am also proud of the job my coaches did with preparing me to compete and all the support from Atlantic Community High School.
Who had the biggest impact on your sucess?
Ken Schappert had the biggest impact on my success he taught me to train and race like a champion. Ken also brought a work hard but have fun culture to the team that I really think helped produce results.
Who was your favorite competitor to run against?
The person I looked forward to competing against the most was Moise Joseph, I would always bring everything I had to every race but he always had just a bit more. We had a lot of great XC,1600m,3200m and 4x800m races over the years. We still run into each other every now and then and we are good friends.
What are your best memories?
Besides athletics my favorite memories are the times I spent with teammates. I still remember all the trips we went on to state and national meets.
You've graduated from UI now, so what are you up to these days?
As far as a career goes I have been competing for Nike and the Oregon Track Club for the past three years, since graduating college from Indiana.
What advice would you give to current high school athletes?
My advise to the high school kids is set a goal for yourself and come up with a plan to accomplish that goal, have fun and enjoy high school track. Florida has a lot of great athletes and it takes a lot of hard work to be competitive but in the end its worth all the sweat.- and there will be a lot of sweat-