Rojé Stona earns SEC Field Athlete of the Week honor

FAYETTEVILLE – Breaking the Arkansas discus record which had stood for 40-plus years and improving it by over 13 feet earned Razorback senior Rojé Stona the SEC Field Athlete of the Week honor.

Stona and teammate Ralford Mullings both bettered the previous UA discus record of 205-4 (62.60), set by Scott Lofquist in 1982, during the initial round of the discus competition at the Mt. SAC Relays this past Saturday.

After opening with a toss of 211-4 (62.79), Stona produced a stellar series and ended with a career best of 218-7 (66.64).

That final effort moved Stona to No. 5 performer on the all-time collegiate list and No. 4 on the Jamaican all-time list. For the 2023 season, Stona is second among collegians and sixth on the world list.

The series for Stona included the following marks in rounds two through five: 209-2 (63.77), foul, 209-3 (63.78), and 215-8 (65.75).

“Coming into this meet I was hoping for a consistent series over 62m,” stated Stona. “I think that’s a decent series to put up, especially in a competition like this which was a really high-class field.

“The group of throwers we have in training is a good culture. We have competition in the weight room and while training, so when we get to a real competition it’s a teamwork type of thing, but we still go at each other.”

California’s Mykolas Alekna, who won the Mt. SAC discus with a mark of 224-3 (68.35), leads the all-time collegiate list with a mark of 225-6 (68.73) with SMU’s Hannes Hopley second at 222-0 (67.66), Penn’s Sam Mattis third with a 221-4 (67.45), and Virginia’s Claudio Romero, who is now at LSU, fourth at 219-11 (67.02).