After a long weekend of traveling, let’s take a look at what went down.
The 300m track at GVSU proved to be as fast as it is known for with PRs from almost everyone who went. Becky started her day with a top five 400m performance at 60.14 and ended it by clobbering the 200m record with a time of 26.18! Alex Bienduga continued his rampant PR streak by dropping almost another second in his 400 with a 51.59. He joined other sprinters Mateusz Lopez and Mason Rosenberg in the 200 where the trio all ran club PR’s with Mateusz coming in at 23.21, Mason at 23.28, and Alex at 23.36. In the 3000 m at GVSU, Anneliese Schulz ran a smart race that resulted in a solid PR of 11:00.99. The guy”s side of the 3K also had a PR with David Choi running a 9:01. They were both so close to going under 11 and 9 minutes respectively but both look to be breaking those barriers in the upcoming Club Relays meet.
There were three incredibly close races this weekend that made for some exciting finishes. First, in the 800, there was a heated battle between sophomore by credit Jason Golden and “Coach” Keith Lee where the duo was less than a half-second apart, coming in at 2:01.40 and 2:01.83. In an even closer race, distance coach Ryan Somerfield narrowly outkicked Wiam Wolf in the mile with the two of them finishing at 4:26.12 and 4:26.14 respectively. Somehow, all the way over in Indiana, two club first years finished just one one-hundredth apart in the closest race of the year so far. Postdoc Alex Lindsay wasn’t about to let the bearded freshman Eli Walker beat him and, unfortunately for Eli, the beard wasn’t enough as Alex beat him by a hair striding through at a 4:33.64 with Eli finishing at a 4:33.65. Also in the Mile, we saw club PRs from Brian Griffin who ran a 4:41.90 and Justin Shim who ran 4:43.94. Emily Condic made her track debut coming through at a 5:40.24 and is still recovering from an injury so make sure you look out for her races in the future!
There were multiple other exciting performances at Taylor, including the return of Jesus Suleman ‘Sully’ Bazai who improved on his Early Bird time in the 200 coming in at 23.28, the same time as Mason a state over. In the 800, Tiffany Yathaputanon ended up crushing her club PR and ran a 2:37.9. In the ring, we saw the debut of sprinter Connor Murphy throwing shot put for the first time leading our group with a nice throw 9.24 m. Obi Azie led the girls with a throw of 9.64 m. Debuting in the hurdles, Joseph Bleyer landed himself on the top 10 list with a speedy time of 9.07 which puts him just behind veteran hurdler Michael Jang. Make sure you guys come out to watch both of those guys and their coach Abby Ralph this weekend at the Orange & Blue meet in the Armory! (And if you stay a bit longer you can watch me run too)
Looking onward to the next weekend, we have our biggest race of the indoor season. Club Relays is our indoor home meet and is an incredibly exciting meet at that. For more information, check out the Club Relays page!