For Calvin Littlejohn, track and field is the pits this year. And he likes it.

	Matt Freed, Post-Gazette Calvin Littlejohn of Butler wins the triple jump with a leap of 46 feet, 5 inches at the Butler Invitational. Click photo for larger image.

Littlejohn, a senior at Butler High School, competed in running events and the high jump last season. This year, he's given up the individual running events and added the long jump and triple jump. Getting down and dirty in the jumping pits has been good for him.

Littlejohn has turned into one of the best jumpers in Western Pennsylvania, and he displayed his newfound talents last night at the Butler Invitational, one of the largest boys' meets in the area, with 32 teams. Littlejohn won the long jump and triple jump and finished second in the high jump. He was one of the top performers at the 40th annual meet.

"My coaches talked me into jumping this year," Littlejohn said. "It's a little rough on the legs, but other than that, I like it. I'm not as nervous in jumping as running."

Littlejohn set school records in the long jump and triple jump. He won the long jump with a mark of 22 feet, 10¹*₂ inches. He won the triple with a 46-5, which was more than two feet farther than his previous best this season. He cleared 6-4 to finish second in the high jump.

"Three firsts would've been better," Littlejohn said with a laugh. "But my knee was bothering me a little bit."

The anterior cruciate ligament in Littlejohn's left knee was torn his sophomore year during the football season and the knee sometimes gives him pain. The only running event he competes in is the 400-meter relay.

Littlejohn also was a standout running back for Butler this past football season and plans to attend Valley Forge Military Academy near Philadelphia for a year.

In other Invitational highlights, North Hills' Ian Fitzgerald set a meet record in the 1,600-meter run and also won the 800. Sharon's Austin Papay broke long-standing meet records in the shot put and discus.

But the much-anticipated 100-meter showdown between Gateway's Justin King and North Hills' Andrew Johnson never occurred. Johnson is the defending WPIAL and PIAA Class AAA 100 champion and King had hoped to challenge Johnson last night. Although North Hills was in the meet, Johnson did not attend. He is at the University of Miami this weekend for the Hurricanes' spring football game. Johnson, a running back, is a Miami football recruit.

"I'm a little disappointed," King said. "I had myself working hard all week to face him. Then he called me [Thursday] and told me he was going to Miami."

King and Johnson are friends and talk often. King also is a football standout who has a number of Division I scholarship offers, even though he is only a junior.

King complained of a sore right hamstring after the 100 final, and he pulled up midway through the 400 relay and fell to the ground, grabbing his hamstring.

He will not run against Johnson until the WPIAL championships. The two could have met at the Baldwin Invitational in a few weeks, but that is the same night as Gateway's prom and King has decided to attend the prom.

Fitzgerald established himself as the king of the 1,600 at Butler, running the event in 4:14.5. The old record was 4:15.1, set by Punxsutawney's Mike England in 1990.

"He did it the hard way, too," said North Hills distance coach John Wilkie. "His splits were 66 seconds, 64, 63 and 60. That's tough to do."

"I didn't want to go out in 66. It was an uphill battle after that," said Fitzgerald, who signed with William & Mary last week.

Sharon's Papay won the shot put with a distance of 63-9, breaking the mark of 62-5, set by Bethel Park's Joe Maciejczyk in 1977. Papay won the discus with a 169-9, breaking the record of 168-5 set by Mt. Lebanon's Phil Rosenstern in 1972.