Penn Relays: NJ's Jim Lambert And Steve Shaklee Honored

Jim Lambert, a veteran track and field reporter and cross-country reporter who covers those sports for NJ MileSplit, and highly decorated Cherokee coach Steve Shaklee were both honored on Saturday at the 129th Penn Relays at Franklin Field in Philadelphia.

Lambert was presented with the prestigious Jesse Abramson Award, and Shaklee was recognized for being an Honorary Referee. 

The Jesse Abramson Award was the first Penn Relays award, established in 1981 upon the death of the great journalist. Abramson worked at the Penn Relays until 1978, first as a reporter and later as a press steward. The award recognizes an active member of the media who has consistently demonstrated a devotion to the Penn Relays, and who has helped get the word out about the world's greatest track and field carnival.

Lambert, who has now covered the Penn Relays 31 times in a row, began covered track and field and cross-country for The Star-Ledger, NJ's largest and only statewide paper, in 1989.After 27 years at The Star-Ledger and NJ.com, he started covering track and field and cross-country for NJ MileSplit in 2017.

During his 36 years covering track and field and cross-country, Lambert received the Allen Dawson Award from the National Scholastic Athletics Foundation (NSAF) for contributions to the sport in 2022 and was honored as the Sports Reporter of the Year by the New Jersey State Interscholastic Association (NJSIAA) in 2002 and in 2016. In 2015, the Garden State Running Club named him as one of the 25 Most Influential People in NJ Running.

Shaklee has put together one of the best coaching careers in NJ history.

After volunteering for several years at his alma mater, Cherry Hill East, Shaklee took a teaching position at Shawnee in 1987 and was named assistant coach for cross country and track. In 1989, he became the head cross country coach. Although he spent only three years in that position, it was a very successful period for the program with two South Jersey Group 4 Championships, a runner-up finish in the Group 4 State Meet and a number one ranking among South Jersey teams. It was also during this time that Shaklee was first voted South Jersey Boys Cross Country Coach of the Year, an honor he would go on to receive four additional times over the course of his career.

In the spring of 1992, the Shawnee boys track team won the Group 4 State Championship and the returning distance squad was loaded for the upcoming cross country season. However, a counseling position became available at Cherokee High and Shaklee took over the head Cherokee cross country and assistant track positions. That fall, while Shawnee won the SJ Group 4 Sectional Championship and placed second at the Group 4 State Meet, Cherokee finished 10th at sectionals and failed to advance. By the next year, however, Shaklee's Cherokee squad managed to beat Shawnee to win the conference championship. From there things really took off and by 1997, Cherokee won its first state championship.

During his years at Cherokee, Shaklee has led the boys cross country team to 24 Burlington County Championships, 24 Conference Championships, 13 South Jersey Group 4 Championships (most ever by a SJ Group 4 team) and 8 Group 4 State Championships (the second most in the history of the Group 4 State Meet). Eight times, his program has earned the number 1 ranking in South Jersey. Since 1995, there have only been five years in which Cherokee has not been one of the top 3 ranked teams in South Jersey. Shaklee's team has also been ranked in the top 10 in the state of New Jersey in 22 of the past 30 years; a consistency matched by very few New Jersey programs in any sport.

Individually, Shaklee has coached five cross country state champions, including Marc Pelerin, who won the 2001 Meet of Champions and who is also a South Jersey Hall of Famer. He also has had two Footlocker National Finalists (Pelerin - 2001, and Shawn Wilson - 2012). In track, Shaklee has remained primarily a distance coach and has had great success with his athletes, eleven of whom have won state championships. During his brief tenure as Cherokee's head track coach, the team won the South Jersey Group 4 Championship in 2001 and two Olympic Conference American Division Championships in 2004 and 2005.

Shaklee, a member of the South Jersey Hall of Fame and the NJSCA Hall of Fame and the New Jersey Scholastic Coaches Association Hall of Fame, retired from Cherokee's counseling department in 2020 but continues at Cherokee as head coach of cross country and assistant in track. In addition to his high school coaching, Shaklee also enjoys working with a few aspiring post-collegiate athletes, including South Jersey alumni Kevin McDonnell, Jimmy Daniels and Mike Iannotta.

Aside from coaching, Shaklee has served the local running community by establishing the Cherokee Challenge in 1996, which has grown to be the largest cross country meet in South Jersey and the second largest in the state. In 1998, with his wife, Cricket Batz, and Villanova Coach, Marcus O'Sullivan, Shaklee co-founded RunningWorks Cross Country Camp and the Day of Distance Coaching Clinic which serves athletes and coaches across the country.