Track and Field starts outdoor season with top finishes in nine events
Torrential rain and powerful winds battered the Central Michigan University track and field athletes Saturday in their outdoor season-opener at the Lenny Lyles-Clark Wood Invitational in Louisville, Ky.
The men and women grabbed nine first place finishes in the un-scored meet, competing against Kent State, Loyola, Louisville and DePaul. On the men’s side, Big Ten opponent Illinois also joined the competition.
“We asked the kids to persevere and give us all they could,” said Mark Guthrie, program director. “Not many of us ran incredibly good times, but with the conditions and the competition, we did pretty well.”
Top finishers included senior Kelsey Ritter and junior Diamond Hamilton, who finished first and third in the 100m dash, respectively. Senior Shawntoreah Turk finished first in the 200-meter dash.
Turk said she has one primary goal this outdoor season.
“My goal is to get the school record for the 400m ,” Turk said. “I’d like to get better on the start of the 400m, so I’m running shorter events at the beginning of the season.”
Junior Ravyn Baxter finished first in the 400m dash, while freshman Kelsey Ross came in third in the 800m run.
Junior Breanne Lesnar and redshirt freshman Kelly Schubert both grabbed MAC automatic qualifiers in the 800 event.
“Going into the race, we knew the weather conditions weren’t ideal," Lesnar said. "Since we had made it all the way there, we did our best not to let the weather affect us."
In the 400m dash, junior Bridget Doughty placed first, and junior Emma Fishnick placed third with a lifetime PR.
“She did a great job getting that personal best,” said Guthrie. “Back at home, you can’t even see the track because of the snow, and (because the indoor track is only 200m) they were really only able to hit the first two hurdles in practice. She ran the 400m without running outside at all yet.”
The poor conditions prepared the Chippewas for overcoming challenges late in the outdoor season.“We could have griped and complained about (the weather), but the athletes went up to the line and did their job,” Guthrie said. “We have to run in these conditions because the MAC 16and regional meet could have those conditions. We’re going to have to learn to manage it so we can handle it better than we did the first time around.”
The track and field teams will compete next weekend at Michigan State University.
