Duo jumping to success

Monday was sophomore Rose Richmond's 20th birthday, and after wishing the jumper a happy birthday, a member of the men's track team told Richmond her next big step is to meet the 20-foot mark in the long jump.\nRichmond has been jumping no more than 18 feet in recent meets, but she jumped 20 feet, 7.75 inches at last summer's USATF Junior Nationals in Texas.\nRichmond isn't the only Hoosier who has reached those marks.\nIn the Hoosiers' two track and field meets this season, Richmond has lost the long jump twice. She's come up short in two consecutive meets to the same competitor -- sophomore Tandra Foster.\nBut if losing means allowing a teammate to win the event, Richmond accepts it. Richmond and Foster consistently finish within one or two places of each other during dual meets. They often trade winning the long jump.\n"We both want to win," Richmond said. "If she wins and I get second, it's the same amount of points for the team. If I win and she gets second, it's the same points for the team. I don't have a problem with it. I mean, we want to win, but she's my teammate."\nAnd as Richmond's teammate for the past two years, Foster has been alongside Richmond as a training partner, opponent and neighbor in Foster Quad. Foster specializes in the long and triple jumps. Richmond, on the other hand, expands beyond those events as a sprinter in the 60-meter dash. She also ran to replace an injured teammate on the Hoosiers' All-American 4x100-meter relay team that took seventh at the NCAA championships.\nWhile Richmond exemplifies strength, shown in her ability to make up time in sprint events, Foster is quicker, jumps coach Wayne Pate said. And this year, Foster has been winning the jumping events against Richmond. Foster won the long jump against Michigan with a leap of six meters while Richmond placed second with a jump of 5.79 meters. Foster also won the long jump against Ohio State with a distance of 5.98 meters.\nLast weekend during an exhibition meet in Indianapolis, Richmond finished second in the long jump among 17 competitors while Foster sat out the meet with a strained quad muscle. Foster is expected to return to competition this weekend at the Indiana Invitational.\n"Every meet I expect to improve on the weekend before," Foster said. "I'm always looking to improve step by step." \nRichmond also wants to improve. She said she hopes to increase her career-best long jump of 20 feet, 7.75 inches by at least a foot. Foster said she expects to hop 20 feet on a more consistent basis. \nPate said he thinks neither Foster nor Richmond have reached their potential. He wants to see both vie at the national level. Both finished in the top five at the USATF Junior National Championships last summer with Foster leaping a career-best jump of 20 feet and Richmond jumping 20 feet, 7.75 inches for fifth and third places, respectively.\n"I think by the time they're both seniors, people are going to take notice of both of them, and I'm sure that would happen if I only had one of them," Pate said. "It's nice having a dual tandem like that. They're equal but opposite."\nThe sophomores will have to improve triple jumping in the absence of senior Maria Fleischmann, the school record holder in the event, who is nursing a back injury, Foster said. Pate is focusing both Foster and Richmond on the long jump, which he thinks is their better event compared to the triple jump. In the triple jump at the indoor Big Ten championships last year, Foster finished 12th and Richmond placed eighth for a total of one point. Foster and Richmond also placed fourth and second in the long jump, respectively, at the indoor championships. \nPate uses the two athletes to show each other strengths and weaknesses. If Foster is hitting her take-off well on the long jump, Pate will point out the performance to Richmond. If Richmond is directing her knees correctly during flight, Pate will tell Foster to look.\nRichmond and Foster should finish 1-2 at the Big Ten championships, Richmond said.\nAnd it doesn't matter who's ahead of the other, as long as one's a Hoosier.\n"It's always better to train with someone who can push you, even though we're not consciously always constantly competing," Foster said. "You always want to be on the same level because we're in the same events all the time"