Bell running the show
Bell, a student at Columbia Elementary School, says he runs five times a week.
Jase Bell has run five half-marathons, four 10-mile races, has more than 60 medals, one national record and eight state records. And he isn’t old enough to drive.
Bell, an 11-year-old six-grader at Columbia Elementary School, has been competing in state and national level races since age 8.
He recently ran in the 11-12 year-old division of the Foot Locker South Regional race, finishing the 3,000-meter in 12:10 min.
Bell placed in the top 30 runners, which means he qualified to be on the Footlocker All-South Team. This is the fourth year in a row he made the team.
“You have to start out fast or you get behind everyone,” Bell said. “There are so many runners, it’s just like a wall. You have to go strong the first mile.”
The week after that, he accomplished yet another feat when he competed in the St. Jude Memphis Half-Marathon in Memphis, Tenn. He competed on the Madison City Schools St. Jude Hero’s team as the youngest team member. Out of the 6,941 finishers, Bell placed 112th overall and first in the 11-15 year-old age division. His time was 1:36:32 for the 13.1 miles.
“With St. Jude’s, you can go at a slower pace, but after six miles you get really sore and you’re really pushing to win,” he said. “After mile eight, I would focus on one more mile. I made it by minute.”
Bell has been practicing at Bob Jones with the cross country and track team for some time now.
“After school, I would go to Bob Jones with my dad and watch everyone run,” he said. “And then, I started running with some of the slower people and he got to where I could run with the best girls. And now, I’m starting to run with some of the guys.”
Next year, he’ll get his chance to officially run with the boys when he becomes a member of the team.
“It’s been six years since I’ve been wanting to be on the team and now I finally get to do it,” Bell said.
His father, Drew Bell, who is the assistant track and field coach at Bob Jones, said winning races is a big deal to Bell because he was the younger people on the team.
“The youngest age allowed to be in one of the races was 11, and for him to win in the 11 to15 ages is a big deal for him,” he said. “He’s been competing really hard since he was 9.
His father said Bell broke the national record for 9-year-olds in the Turkey 10 miler in Mobile last year.
His father, also an avid runner, recently had surgery to remove a calcium build up in his bone. In two weeks, he will go in for surgery on the other leg. Bell always ran the race with his son, but won’t be able to be by his side during his next competition, the Southeast 10-Mile Championship Race, Jan. 8 in Birmingham.
“I hope to do the Peachtree race in Atlanta with him next summer,” his father said. “It’s just neat to be hanging out with your son, doing the same thing we love to do together. He pushes us all.”
Bell aspires to have become a company-sponsored racer one day.
“He’s going to keep getting faster, and I’m going to get slower but at least this year we enjoyed running together,” his father said.
