Katelyn Tuohy Earns 2020 Track Gatorade Athlete Of The Year


CHICAGO (June 25, 2020) - In its 35th year of honoring the nation's best high school athletes, The Gatorade Company today announced Katelyn Tuohy of North Rockland High School as its 2019-20 Gatorade New York Girls Track & Field Athlete of the Year. Tuohy is the third Gatorade New York Girls Track & Field Athlete of the Year to be chosen from North Rockland High School.

The award, which recognizes not only outstanding athletic excellence, but also high standards of academic achievement and exemplary character demonstrated on and off the field, distinguishes Tuohy as New York's best high school girls track & field athlete. Now a finalist for the prestigious Gatorade National Girls Track & Field Athlete of the Year award to be announced in June, Tuohy joins an elite alumni association of state award-winners in 12 sports, including Lolo Jones (1997- 98, Roosevelt High School, Iowa), Allyson Felix (2002-03, Los Angeles Baptist High School, Calif.), Robert Griffin III (2006-07, Copperas Cove High School, Texas), Grant Fisher (2013-14 & 2014-15, Grand Blanc High School, Mich.) and Candace Hill (2014-15, Rockdale County High School, Ga.).

The 5-foot-4 senior won the 1500-meter run at the indoor state championship meet this past season with a meet-record time of 4:20.81, which ranked as the nation's No. 2 performances among prep competitors indoors in 2020. The state's two-time returning Gatorade Girls Track and Field Athlete of the Year, Tuohy is the most decorated athlete in the history of the Gatorade program and the first to win national awards in two different sports (cross country and track & field). Having won six state awards in track and cross country along with winning Gatorade national honors four times, she was also the program's 2018 Female High School Athlete of the Year. She concluded her historic prep career with 11 individual state titles and five national high school records. Tuohy won the Nike Cross Nationals Finals three times in the sport of cross country, captured three individual track and field national championships and anchored five national title-winning distance medley relay quartets.

Tuohy has volunteered locally on behalf of youth soccer and running programs and the Rose Memorial Library. "She's one of the best runners of all-time in the U.S., and everything she did was at such a high level," said North Rockland High School coach Steve Sutton. "Some of Katelyn's races are just jaw-dropping. I've coached for 25 years and I've never seen anything like it. Some of her workouts were even more amazing. The thing about her is that she always thinks about the team first. She wants to be part of something big and special even more than she wants to be special herself."

Tuohy has maintained an A average in the classroom. She has signed a National Letter of Intent to run on scholarship at North Carolina State University.

The Gatorade Player of the Year program annually recognizes one winner in the District of Columbia and each of the 50 states that sanction high school football, girls volleyball, boys and girls cross country, boys and girls basketball, boys and girls soccer, baseball, softball, and boys and girls track & field, and awards one National Player of the Year in each sport. The selection process is administered by the Gatorade Player of the Year Selection Committee, which work with top sport-specific experts and a media advisory board of accomplished, veteran prep sports journalists to determine the state winners in each sport.

Three-time winner Tuohy joins recent Gatorade New York Girls Track & Field Athletes of the Year Sammy Watson (2016-17, 2015-16 & 2014-15, Rush-Henrietta Senior High School) and Zola Golden (2013-14, Arlington High School) among the state's list of former award winners.

Since the program's inception in 1985, Gatorade Player of the Year award recipients have won hundreds of professional and college championships, and many have also turned into pillars in their communities, becoming coaches, business owners and educators.

To learn more about the Gatorade Player of the Year program, check out past winners or to nominate student-athletes, visit www.Gatorade.com/POY, on Facebook at www.facebook.com/GatoradePOY or follow us on Twitter at www.twitter.com/Gatorade.