Saturday • June 13, 2009 • Folsom High School, Folsom, CA

 

Mason Finley on Track for a GWI Discus Record

By Bob Burns

Mason Finley at the 2009 Arcaia Invitational (Photo courtesy of Dyestat & John Nepolitan)

When Mason Finley was a youngster with a hankering for McDonald’s Happy Meals, his father got an idea.

Jared Finley taped together a couple of the throwaway mini-frisbees that came with the chicken strips. He inserted some sand in the middle to give it enough weight to fly rather than flutter, then told his fifth-grade son to give the homemade implement a whirl.

“It really shot out there,” Jared Finley said. “I said, ‘Oh my God, he might take to this.’”

He took to it, all right. Mason, a 6-foot-8, 330-pound senior at Buena Vista High School in Colorado, set a national high school record on April 25 by throwing the discus 236 feet, 6 inches. Mason will be shooting for the same title his father won 32 years earlier when he competes in the Golden West Invitational on June 13 at Folsom High School.

“It’d be kind of cool to get my name on the plaque,” Mason Finley said.

Jared Finley won the GWI title in 1977 with a throw of 193-10. He competed at the University of Wyoming and still ranks second on the school’s all-time list at 192-3. Jared didn’t set out to raise a discus thrower, but when his son showed an interest, Dad was more than happy to assist.

“Since middle school, I’ve known I wanted to do track,” Mason said.

Mason also played football and basketball at Buena Vista, a school of just 375 students in central Colorado.

“Being such a big kid at a small school, there’s a lot of peer pressure to play the other sports,” Jared Finley said. “There aren’t a lot of kids to pick from.”

As the nation’s top-ranked high school discus thrower in 2008, Mason entered the season intent on breaking the national record. Niklas Arrhenius threw 234-3 in 2001.

Last year, Mason trained exclusively with the heavier college discus. In retrospect, Jared says that was a mistake, throwing his son’s technique out of whack when he threw the lighter high school implement.

In early April, Mason won the shot put and discus at the Arcadia Invitational. He then threw a personal-best 223-4½ at the Gunnison Invitational, where he also topped 70 feet for the first time in the shot (71-3¼). The following week, at the High Altitude Challenge in Alamosa, Finley added more than two feet to the national record.

“The weather was good, I had a good wind and my technique was probably at its highest level,” Finley said. “I knew it was a good throw, but when I heard it was the record, I was in shock.”

Finley won the shot put (67-10¼) and discus (214) at the Colorado 3A State Meet in May. He finished more than 17 feet of the runner-up in the shot and 68 feet ahead of the next-best discus thrower. Finley’s performances are even more remarkable when measured against the spring weather conditions in Colorado.

“We don’t have any indoor facilities here,” Jared Finley said. “But we make do all right.”

Mason will attend UCLA on a track scholarship in the fall. He visited Kansas, Missouri, Arizona State and Texas A&M prior to leaving snowbound Denver for a December visit to sunny Southern California.

“We forgot it was winter when we were there,” Jared said. “Mason told me, ‘I love it here.’ Then we flew back into the winter.”

Jared said he made a point of letting his son decide for himself.

“The first school that offered me a scholarship, my dad said, ‘Sign it,’” said Jared, who works for the Colorado Department of Corrections.

At UCLA, Mason will be coached by Art Venegas. Venegas has coached such world-class throwers as John Godina, John Brenner, Seilala Sua and Suzy Powell.

“I liked the coach,” Mason said. “He’s like my dad in some ways. Plus, the weather’s great for throwing and it’s a great school.”

Before heading to UCLA, Finley hopes to make the U.S. national junior team. He’ll also take aim at one of the Golden West Invitational’s most esteemed meet records. Kamy Keshmiri (Reno, Nev.) set what was then a national high school record of 225-2 in winning the 1987 GWI.

Jared Finley says he doesn’t remember much about his 1977 GWI victory.

“That’s a long time ago,” he said. “It was my only meet outside of Kansas. I’d never been on airplane before.”

Jared admits it might take some adjusting when his son and prized pupil heads west for college. But he has two younger daughters who have shown a similar inclination for the discus.

“They’ll be good if they stick with it,” Jared Finley said. “They’re going to be at least 6-3, maybe taller. We’ve got a good genetic pool going on here.”