The women’s indoor track and field team participated in their third competition on Saturday. Based on the results, their future looks promising. Five individuals have already qualified for the Eastern College Athletic Conference championships and one of these five individuals has also already qualified for the USA Track and Field Indoor Nationals.
“I think the team’s doing really, really well,” thrower and freshman Bridget Mayne said. “You go to the meets and people look at you and say, ‘wow, they’re a good team.'”
Saturday’s meet at Rochester Institute of Technology furnished two champions from UR. Senior Cynthia Gurecki won the weight throw with a distance of 14.35 meters, which qualified her for the ECAC championships. Also, the 4×400-meter relay team, consisting of freshmen Kate Medford and Alexis Kirk, senior Kate Pohlman and sophomore Stacie Woods, finished in first place with a time of 4:18.69.
Senior Jessica Van Binsbergen placed third in the 5,000-meter run. She ran a personal best 18:35.16, qualifying her for ECAC championships.
Woods finished second in the 500-meter dash, but her time of 1:21.89 qualified her for the ECAC championships.
Many other individuals posted personal bests and placed in scoring positions.
At last weekend’s home Snowflake Invitational, freshman Jamie Landry won the high jump and qualified for the ECAC championships with a jump of 1.58 meters. After just two meets, she accumulated enough points to qualify for the New York State pentathlon championships in February. To qualify, athletes must score a total of at least 2,000 points in pentathlon events. Her scores in the high jump, long jump, shot put and high hurdles earned her 2,354 points. She will also run the 800-meter run for the pentathlon.
Perhaps the Yellowjackets’ most successful athlete this season is sophomore Laura Richenderfer. Saturday, she was second overall in the combined men’s and women’s one mile race walk. She was the first female finisher with a time of 7:27.2. At the Snowflake Invitational, Richenderfer obliterated her own school record in the 3,000-meter race walk with a time of 14:13.99. This qualified her for the USA Track and Field Indoor Nationals in Boston, Mass. This time would have placed her fifth in last winter’s national meet.
With quite a few promising freshmen and some veterans to lead the way, it looks as though the Yellowjackets can look forward to a successful season this year.
“I think we’ll just get better,” Mayne said. “The freshmen are coming in, and I think we’re really strong.”
This coming Saturday the women travel to Saint Lawrence University for the St. Lawrence Indoor Invitational.
Philbrick can be reached at ephilbrick@campustimes.org.
