Thanks, Jeep, for those results. It is a bit of a challenge to keep up with meets in 2 locations!
A good day for Tech overall, particularly at the end of the day at both meets. Guess I will start off with the absolute highlights and surprise, surprise, Sally Kipyego leads the way:
-Sally actually finished 2nd in the mile to a runner from Asics, but she ran a PR of 4:32.01 and qualified automatically by 8 seconds! She amazes me time after time.
-Anthony Flemons had a great day, finishing 2nd in the LJ with a new PR and provisional jump of 25-6, only finishing behind former Aggie Fabrice LaPierre.
-Lillian Badaru also had an excellent run, finishing 2nd in the Invitational 3K with a PR and provisional time of 9:28.90. She will probably need to improve that time around 4-5 seconds to get into the national, but it is an excellent effort heading into conference!
Other efforts in College Station:
400 - Tim Foster runs a PR of 48.38 and Tim has become one of the steadiest quartermilers this year. He is vying to force his way onto the 4X400. Bill Lawhorn (48.63) and Rodney Mims (48.73) ran okay, but both need to step it up for conference.
600y - Brandon Washington continues his climb back from his broken leg in 2007 with a winning effort of 1:10.53, still 2 seconds slower than his PR, but you can just see the old confidence creeping back into Brandon. Lamont Adams ran a slow 1:14.00, but it was his first run after a pulled hammy 4 weeks ago and he is trying to ease back in.
60 - Julius Walker qualified for the finals tomorrow with a 6.87. Markus Henderson just missed the finals (in fact, his time was identical to the final qualifiers, be must have missed by thousandths) with a 6.92.
60H - Omo Osaghae had an excellent provisional time of 7.87 (a PR)in qualifying for the finals. Jamele Mason also made the finals with an 8.02. Only Brandon Tucker disappointed, missing the finals by a long ways with an 8.35. Brandon did come back to run a solid 22.00 in the 200 later in the day. The freshman just seems to be having trouble moving up to the higher hurdle.
LJ - Waylon Randolph also had a good LJ of 24-2.25, plus Darrell Roddick jumped 23-8.75.
HJ - Darrell jumped 6-8.25, but I was disappointed in Justin Turner's 6-6.75. I hope that Justin can get back up to that 6-11 height he jumped 3 weeks ago.
PV - Amanda Alley had a solid outing winning the PV with a 12-6.25. Sage Lasater actually had her worst outing as a Red Raider, but still vaulted 12-0.5
SP - a very average day for Patience Knight (53-11) and DeDe Carter (47-3). I hope they are getting used to that throwing ring, since both conference and nationals will be in that same ring!
60H - Tori Smith (8.52) and Sandra Iwunze (8.61) both made the finals and Tori had another PR. For the first time this year, walkon freshman Jamie Simanek (9.10) did not improve.
- Terra Evans easily qualified for the finals in the 60 (7.40).
-200 - Jonisha Boleware is simply not making any substantial progress, running 24.94 and the same can be said of Janell Appelhans in the LJ (17-8.25).
Over in Fayetteville, most of efforts were PR's, including Sally's run in the mile and Lillian's run in the 3K.
-Addison Lemaster ran a PR in the mile (5:17.31) as she continues solid, if unspectacular, progress from her injury in her HS senior year.
800 - PR efforts Gladys Kipsang (2:09.38) and Asia Diaz (2:09.92), both missing the provisional qualifying time by less than a second. This is definitely the best I have ever seen Asia running in her career at Tech!
Mile - PR efforts by 3 milers - freshman Zach Dawson (4:17.45), Cory Higgins (4:11.66 - in his best effort ever as a Red Raider), Nathan Milles (4:16.53), plus a solid effort from Silas Kemboi (4:11.29). In the Olympic Development mile, Gilbert Limo 4:05.86. In the last 4 weeks, Gilbert has run a 4:06, a 4:05.5, and a 4:05.8. That seems to be right about where he is going to run a mile this year. That is probably good enough to place pretty well at conference.
Tomorrow, more action at 2 sites! I will try to recap the day sometime tomorrow night or Sunday afternoon. Amazingly, it is only 2 weeks to the conference meet and this is the last competitive weekend before conference. I hope to see more encouraging signs tomorrow.
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