Built for All Ten: Jay Lee Signs with Colorado State for the Decathlon

Legacy Academy senior standout Jay Lee recently signed a National Letter of Intent to compete at Colorado State in the decathlon. “It’s hard,” Lee explained.  “You’ve got to be able to run, throw, jump, you gotta do it all, so it’s not for the weak. It take a lot of mental toughness.”

So how did a high schooler get into a unique track competition involving ten events? “My dad planted the seed in my head a long time ago,” Lee said.  “I fought him for a little bit on it, I didn’t like all the events.  I finally saw the writing on the wall and I realized this was my ticket.”

The decathlon is 100 meter dash, long jump, shot put, high jump, 400 meter run, 110 meter hurdles, discus, pole vault, javelin, and 1500 meter run. “My favorite event is the pole vault. My least favorite event is the 110 hurdles.  I battle with those a lot and they get taller in college, so I definitely have to work on that,” said Lee.

Jay’s early goal at Colorado State will be to develop his skills in all of the events. “My first year, I just want to have fun and understand and learn the event ,” said Lee.  “It’s not that I don’t want to be competitive my first two years, but I want to learn and develop each event and by the time I’m a junior and senior I can really progress and score at the conference meets and go to nationals and do big things.”

“High school track has prepared me for it.  I’ve done five events every year at the state track meet and they’ve all been different every year. Whatever my dad needed for us to score to get as close as we can to winning a blue trophy.  We fell short a couple years, but this year we’re going to pull it through.”

Jay isn’t sure which five events he’ll compete in at state, but he already qualified for nine of them, so he’ll have some options.