Juliana Yendork (born 29 August 1972) is a retired

Ghanaian American Ghanaian Americans are an ethnic group of Americans of full or partial Ghanaian ancestry or Ghanaian immigrants who became naturalized citizen of the United States. History Early history The first people to arrive from the region then known ...

long jump The long jump is a track and field event in which athletes combine speed, strength and agility in an attempt to leap as far as possible from a takeoff point. Along with the triple jump, the two events that measure jumping for distance as a gr ...

er and

triple jump The triple jump, sometimes referred to as the hop, step and jump or the hop, skip and jump, is a track and field event, similar to the long jump. As a group, the two events are referred to as the "horizontal jumps". The competitor runs down th ...

er. She won the gold medal at the 1988 African Championships. That year she also competed at the

1988 Olympic Games 1988 Olympics refers to both: *The 1988 Winter Olympics, which were held in Calgary, Alberta, Canada *The 1988 Summer Olympics The 1988 Summer Olympics (), officially known as the Games of the XXIV Olympiad () and commonly known as Seoul ...

, one month before her 16th birthday to fulfill the dream of her father, Charles who had been denied the opportunity to compete in the 1976 Olympic Games by the hastily called African boycott. Her personal best jump was 6.32 metres, achieved in June 1989 in

Schwechat Schwechat () is a town southeast of Vienna known for the Vienna International Airport and Schwechater beer. The city is home to the refineries of the Austrian national oil company OMV. Geography Schwechat is named after the river Schwechat, whi ...

. She later became an American citizen, and focused on the

, setting a career best of 13.42 metres in May 1991 in Norwalk in the qualification round of the CIF California State Meet while still at

Walnut High School Walnut High School is a public high school located at Walnut, California, among the San Jose Hills of the San Gabriel Valley in Southern California. Ranked in the top 100 high schools in America by the Daily Beast Publication, Walnut High Schoo ...

. That mark stood as the National High School Record for ten years. She won both the Long Jump and Triple Jump at the state meet three years in a row, each time by large margins. Her freshman year she competed for University High School in

Waco, Texas Waco ( ) is the county seat of McLennan County, Texas, United States. It is situated along the Brazos River and I-35, halfway between Dallas and Austin. The city had a 2020 population of 138,486, making it the 22nd-most populous city in the ...

. She continued competing for

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California St ...

, who also hired her father as their jumps coach but never attained the high level marks of her high school days. She was inducted into the Mt. SAC Relays Hall of Fame in 1993.https://articles.latimes.com/1993-04-15/news/ga-23058_1_sac-track-meet LA Times April 15, 1993

References

External links

California State Records before 2000Juliana Yendork jumping in high school
{{DEFAULTSORT:Yendork, Juliana 1972 births Living people Ghanaian female triple jumpers American female triple jumpers Ghanaian female long jumpers American female long jumpers Olympic athletes of Ghana Athletes (track and field) at the 1988 Summer Olympics American sportspeople of Ghanaian descent UCLA Bruins women's track and field athletes Track and field athletes from California African-American female track and field athletes 21st-century African-American sportspeople 21st-century African-American women 20th-century African-American sportspeople 20th-century African-American women