Temple University’s women’s track and field achieved multiple personal records, season-bests, and 10 top-10 finishes after competing in the Penn 8-Team Select in Staten Island, New York on Saturday.
“To see our athletes improve, that’s the most important thing this early in the season,” coach Elvis Forde said. We walked away feeling pretty good with what we saw, so they’ll go back to school and go back to work for the next couple of weeks because today told us that this indoor track season is in full swing. We have to be ready for all of our competition here on out.”
Sophomore sprinter/hurdler Sydney Williams completed the 60-meter hurdles in 8.94 seconds to place fourth.
Junior distance runners Grace Moore, Millie Howard, Kira Von Ehren and sophomore distance runner Helene Gottlieb each competed for the first time this season.
Moore broke her personal mile record with a time of 4 minutes, 48.90 seconds. She earned second place in the event behind Providence College redshirt-junior distance runner Brianna Ilarda by 2.09 seconds.
“[Moore] established a new personal best for herself, which is outstanding this early in the season,” Forde said. “So that just speaks volumes to what she can do with the rest of the season.”
With a time of 4:57.39, Von Ehren finished in seventh place.
Gottlieb finished sixth in the 800-meter with a time of 2:10.71, Howard finishing behind Gottlieb 1.11 seconds later. Sophomore distance runner McKenzie Gelvin and senior distance runner Ashton Dunkley finished in eighth and ninth places respectively in the 800-meter with times of 2:14.89 and 2:15.46.
Sophomore jumper Aisha Brown broke her own personal record in the high jump. She jumped 1.73-meters, tieing for second place with Penn’s multi-event junior Olivia Welsh.
Freshman sprinter Marissa White set another 400-meter personal record placing fifth with a time of 57.29 seconds.
Brown, Gottlieb, White and junior sprinter Madison Beecher ran the 4×400-meter relay in 3:50.70 and finished in second place.
“We’ve got to clean up a few things, but that’s normal,” Forde said. “So our message to the team has to be to run all the way across that finish line no matter what, because a tenth of a second could be the difference between making a final event and just missing being in the finals.”
Temple will look to break more records when they go back to New York to compete in the Columbia Challenge on Friday, Jan. 25 and Saturday, Jan. 26.
Be the first to comment