Greenville, ILL. -- On Saturday, April 13, Principia College's track and field teams traveled to Greenville, IL for some tough competition. Teams competing included perennial NCAA Division III national powerhouse Washington University as well as Augustana College which often places high at the same national meet. Additionally, Olivet Nazarene University which routinely places high at NAIA nationals was present.
It was a tough day for some athletes that often place high in meets. To score points in the meet an athlete must place in the top eight. Most events had twenty to forty competitors and several had more. Still, there were several highlights with personal records (PR) and first time performances.
Getting things rolling early in the day were the field event athletes and junior
Chris Puduski continued the theme of hammer success by Principia athletes this season (be sure to also read about the women's success) when he launched the hammer 51.86 meters (170' 2"). While placing third, this was a new PR by 1.27 meters which makes two weeks in a row that Chris broke the school record. Other highlights in the throws included sophomore
Stan Ott's first time in the javelin with a throw of 25.51 meters (83' 8").
The first events on the track are distance events and in the 1500 meter run, freshman Simon Karega had an 8 second improvement from one week ago to set a new PR of 4:22. This is equivalent to a six second PR from his high school 1600 meter run.
There were originally 44 people entered in the 800 and it was divided up into four heats of 11 runners. There was an unusual amount of fast times entered for a midseason meet. Junior
Abe Ott and freshman E.G. Pierce weren't able to be placed in the first heat with the fastest runners. They made up for it running in the second heat as Abe ran to a three second PR to place third overall in 1:58. E.G. ran to a sixth place finish in 1:59.
The first sprint event of the day was the 400 and sophomore
Corey Carter ran the event for the first time since ninth grade. Obviously he set a PR then when he ran 48.96 to place fourth. That also put him in second place on Principia's all-time best performances. Corey wasn't done yet. Corey won the 200 in 21.49 and had quality competition in the race. Sophomore
Brian Malambwe ran 22.83 in the 200 to set a new PR by .38 seconds which is considered an enormous improvement. With that kind of improvement, Brian can start setting his sights on making Principia's top ten list. After narrowly missing out on a PR in the 800 by .07 seconds, senior
Josh Keeley ran the 200 in 24.91 into the strongest headwind of the day at 2.4 meters per second for his first ever 200. Another first timer was freshman Jack Beckett with a 25.21 which followed his first time ever running the 100 in 12.59.
Full results for men and women can be found here:
http://trxctiming.com/liveresults/meet6/
Next Up
The team will travel to Rose Hulman in Terre Haute, IN on Friday, April 19 for a late afternoon/evening meet and final tune up for the SLIAC meet in late April.
