Jefferson Academy’s Kelly-Cannon nabs Daily Camera track athlete of …

When Chrisly Kelly-Cannon stepped onto the Jeffco Stadium track for the Class 3A 100-meter dash at last month’s state track and field championships, his mother Jacqueline Kelly couldn’t contain her emotions.

Her son, who she adopted from Haiti 12 years earlier, wasn’t preparing himself like the rest of his competitors. He took the time to do something more meaningful, something that has defined the last three years of his illustrious career at Jefferson Academy.

He was enjoying the moment.

“I had never been at the start line before,” Kelly said. “I’ve always been at the finish, but I wanted to watch. He walked out. Everybody else was jumping and doing their little sprints, and he walked out and he raised his hands to the sky and his chest and he closed his eyes. I lost it. I started crying like crazy, because he’s grateful and thanking God for his gifts, and he’s having fun.”

The Jaguar senior, who had been chasing a title in the 100 all year long, then bolted toward the finish line. He beat out Montezuma-Cortez’s Zander Cruzan by mere inches and 0.001 seconds to complete the photo finish and secure the gold. His time of 10.604 seconds tied the Class 3A state meet record.

Two years earlier, he captured Jefferson Academy’s first-ever state title in the sport when he won the long jump and set the 3A meet record at 23 feet, 1.5 inches. He completed his final high school meet with one gold, a silver in the 200-meter dash (21.65 seconds), a bronze in the long jump (22–3) and sixth in the triple jump (42–7).

His talent wasn’t contained to just track and field. During the fall soccer slate, he broke the school record for most goals in a season after leading the team to the third round of the Class 3A state playoffs. He scored 26 times this year alone.

Kelly-Cannon earned the Daily Camera boys track athlete of the year not just for a strong senior campaign, but for the remarkable career he’s been able to put together over the past three seasons, after COVID.

Each, he said, has helped him grow not just as an athlete, but as a person.

“I think state my sophomore year was the highlight just because I was the first track athlete at this school to win a state title, which was cool, being a sophomore,” Kelly-Cannon said. “In long jump, that was awesome, setting the state record. That was really fun.

“Junior year was the year of development, I think. Getting hurt quite a bit that year and understanding how my body works and what I need (to do) to recover and stuff, that was a great way of learning. I brought that into my senior year, this year, and I just sort of flew off the charts. I think I did really, really good this year. I’m proud of myself.”

His mother, who serves as a personal trainer and owns Kelly Performance and Wellness, always knew he had it in him, from the day she adopted Chrisly and his younger brother, Jamesly, from an island nation that had just suffered the devastating 2010 earthquake that killed 250,000 people.

Kelly enrolled them in youth sports from the very beginning, not just to tap into their athleticism, but to help them heal from the trauma they experienced at ages 3 and 4.

“We put them in all kinds of sports here once they got to Colorado. Chrisly was on clubs, soccer teams,” she said. “When they moved here, they were scared to be inside, even though it was January and it was freezing out. We were outside riding bikes, kicking balls, shooting baskets and playing catch, freezing to death. It just continued.”

With his high school career firmly behind him now, Chrisly looks forward to what his college career will bring once he joins his teammates at Grand Valley State University in Michigan. He plans to focus more on his sprints, and believes he can excel within a Division-II program that has won multiple national titles.

Kelly knows he can achieve anything he sets his mind — and his heart — to. She’s witnessed it time and again.

“He knows how to suffer,” she said. “To be an athlete, you have to be willing to suffer and especially in track in like the 200 or the 400. You think you’re going to die when you’re running. I think from where they came from, starting, unfortunately, with all of that suffering, that’s not something that they’re as afraid of as other people who haven’t experienced those things. I think that weighs pretty heavy.”