Women's Track off to a Good Start at Springfield
SPRINGFIELD, MA -- It was cold, wet, and windy with a temperature of 57 degrees and according to the news it felt like 37. These are the weather conditions that the women's track and field team competed in yesterday at the Springfield College season opener. The Ephs were still on spring break and approached this meet as a training event. Most of the women's team were in events unfamiliar to them, either working on speed or endurance, by moving up or down in events.
Five women represented in the Ephs in the 200m. First year Kelsey Ham took third in the 200m with a time of 26.94. Sara Wild new to the 200m took 8th with a time of 28.43, which will help her with her speed for the 800m
Coming back in the 400m Kelsey Ham would go on to improve her 3rd place 200m finish with a 1st place in a time of 1:00.90. Sara Wild took fourth in 1:01.75. Two more Ephs would go on to finish in the top 8, sophomore Kylie Huckleberry and freshman Hillary Higgs. Williams was not represented in the 800m due to the 800m runners running the 400m and 200m races along with relays.
With almost four laps to go Robin Kuntz would post the Ephs best finish taking 3rd with a time of 4:58.35. Julie McNamara and Ryan Jacoby would go on to take 7th and 8th place finishing 6 seconds apart.
It was a sweep in the 5k with the Ephs taking 1st through 3rd keeping the entire field, including Amherst at their back. Meghan Shea, Tina Meade, and Olga Kondratjeva finished in that order boasting times of 18:08.27, 18:24.76, and 18:26.18. Mary Feeley who ran the first race of the day went on to run her 10k in a time on 38:53.76.
In the 100m high hurdles and 400m intermediate hurdles first year Karyn Moss was consistent in clinching 4th and showed her versatility to finishing 4th also in the triple jump. Moss ran 16 seconds flat in the high hurdles and 1:09.79 in the intermediate hurdles. She also went on to jump 35-01.75 in the triple jump. Right behind Moss in the 400m hurdles was Junior Nora Mitchell in 5th with a time of 1:10.41. Followed by first year Maya Harakawa running 1:11.13. Junior Emily Heaslip also competed in the 400m hurdles yesterday for the first time and clocked a 1:14.25.
In the relays Williams 4x100 took first with 50.44 an improvement from their debut but not a performance indicative of the best of their abilities. The team once again consisted of junior Elise Johnson, sophomore Anne Kerth, and first years Kelsey Ham and Hillary Higgs. There were two 4x400m relay teams put together from the four that were entered. Injury plagued many of the Ephs and kept them from running further events. The 4x400m relay teams hit times of 4:20.45 and 4:24.59.
For the field team sophomore Sara Turner took fourth in the high jump with a finishing height of 4-11.00. Sophomore Rachel Teitelbum took second in the pole volt soaring over 9-09.00. Sophomore Sara Turner would come back to again take 3rd in long jump with a jump of 16-04.25. She was followed by first year Kelsey Ham who had a jump of 15-11.00, goodenough for 4th.
Throwing into the heavy wind Madeline Watson and Julie Becker took 3rd and 4th in the shot put. Watson threw 35-05 while Becker threw 35-01.00. Watson's big show would come in the discus, as she took second with a throw in 108-09. Julia Cohan took first all by herself with a throw of 120.03 in the javelin.
Overall as a team the Ephs finished third through all the injuries and horrible weather. During the week as the Ephs go back to personal event training there are high goals of getting healthy and ready to compete well. There were definitely some good workouts in Miami as noted by all of the coaches and the times will soon show how hard the Ephs worked over spring break.
