CHICAGO (June 24, 2019) — In its 34th year of honoring the nation’s best high school athletes, The Gatorade Company today announced Cameron Hudson of Cedar Shoals High School as its 2018-19 Gatorade Georgia Boys Track & Field Athlete of the Year. Hudson is the first Gatorade Georgia Boys Track & Field Athlete of the Year to be chosen from Cedar Shoals 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 track, distinguishes Hudson as Georgia’s best high school boys track & field athlete. Now a finalist for the prestigious Gatorade National Boys Track & Field Athlete of the Year award to be announced in June, Hudson joins an elite alumni association of state track & field award-winners, 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-10, 165-pound senior won the triple jump at the state meet with a personal-best leap of 50 feet, two inches, which ranked as the nation’s No. 7 performance among prep competitors this season at the time of his selection. Hudson cleared 50 feet three times this spring, more than all but one of the jumpers ranked ahead of him. Naturally, Hudson also finished second in the 300-meter hurdles at states with a personal-best clocking of 37.02 seconds, helping the Jaguars to a ninth-place finish as a team in Class 5A. His hurdles time ranked No. 17 in the country.
As a member of the Cedar Shoals football team, Hudson visited local elementary schools to mentor K-5 students. A devoted member of East Friendship Baptist Church, he serves as a youth usher. He has also donated his time on behalf of the Clarke County School District Special Olympics. “Cameron Hudson PR’d in both his events at the GHSA state championships, producing a Top-20 and a Top-10 performance among U.S. prep boys to this point in the season,” said Erik Boal, editor for DyeStat.com. “His triple jump of 50 feet, 2 inches was nearly three feet farther than any other prep athlete in Georgia, and is made all the more impressive by the fact he did it into a 2.8 mile-per-hour headwind.”
Hudson has maintained a weighted 3.04 GPA in the classroom and has signed a national letter of intent to play football at Tennessee Tech University beginning this fall.
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. From the 12 national winners, one male and one female athlete are each named Gatorade High School Athlete of the Year. In all, 607 athletes are honored each year.
Hudson joins recent Gatorade Georgia Boys Track & Field Athletes of the Year Cameron Murray (2017-18, Westlake High School), Elija Godwin (2016-17, Newton High School), Isaiah Rogers (2015-16, Campbell High School), Ryan Clark (2014-15, Banneker High School) and Kenny Selmon (2013-14, Pace Academy) among the state’s list of former award winners.
As a part of Gatorade’s cause marketing platform “Play it Forward,” Hudson also has the opportunity to award a $1,000 grant to a local or national youth sports organization of his choosing. He is also eligible to submit an essay to win one of twelve $10,000 spotlight grants for the organization of choice, which will be announced throughout the year.
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.
