Women's track wins UR Invitational

The women’s indoor track and field team wasted little time getting back in stride after more than a month-long break, winning Sunday’s UR Invitational. The victory didn’t come easy, however, as Roberts Wesleyan proved to be very difficult competition. “It’s always difficult after you’ve had a long break. Even though we’ve been training, the intensity [during practice] isn’t quite the same. I was pleased, even a bit surprised that we won given the number of people Roberts had. It goes to prove just how important everyone’s effort was,” Head Coach Barbara Hartwig said. The women proved to be extremely consistent on Sunday, placing among the scorers in every event in which a member of the UR team entered. “I like the fact that we’re getting a lot of points from a lot of different areas. Our greatest strength is that we’re gonna get points in a multitude of events,” Hartwig said. In the 55-meter dash, freshman Allison Altman placed fourth with a time of 8.41 seconds, earning four points. She also finished fourth in the 200-meter dash, running 30.78 seconds. The UR women had the winners in both the 400- and 500- meter dashes, which were won by senior Michelle Gabriele and junior Katie O’Brien respectively. Junior Elizabeth Canfield was second in the 800 meter run, finishing the race in 2:34.63. The 1,000-meter run saw three UR women place, as sophomore Kate Pohlman, freshman Charlotte Reardon and senior Lisa Brassaw were all in the top five. In the 1,500-meter run, senior Erika Wasserstein, Charlotte Reardon and sophomore Christina Purpura were third, fourth and sixth respectively, with times of 5:16.99, 5:31.30 and 5:50.38. Sophomore Jessica VanBinsbergen was third in the 3,000-meter run with a time of 11:49.20. She was followed by junior Elizabeth Boerman, who was fifth, completing the race in 13:19.74. In the 4×200-meter relay, the team of junior Annie Barbi, Gabriele, Allison Altman and senior Katrina Nowak finished second with a time of 2:02.09. Gabriele, Nowak and Altman later teamed up with Kate Pohlman in the 4×400 meter relay to finish first overall with a time of 4:34.10, defeating the RIT relay team by just 2.4 seconds. The women’s relay teams continued their domination when the 4×800 team of senior Erika Wasserstein, freshman Charlotte Reardon, sophomore Katie O’Brien and junior Elizabeth Canfield also finished first with a time of 10:17, easily defeating the second place Roberts team. In the high jump, Annie Barbi marked 1.52 meters to finish first and freshman Melinda Huang tied for second with a mark of 1.47 meters. Three women placed in the top five in the long jump, as Nowak, Gabriele and Annie Barbi placed second, third and fifth respectively. Nowak also placed fourth in the triple jump, along with sophomore Laura Porterfield who finished first. Four of the top six in the shot put were members of the UR team, as freshman Maraea Toomalatai, sophomore Marie Gurecki, sophomore Grace Kraay and freshman Katie Odian were second, third, fifth and sixth. Junior Anne Baker was first overall in the hammer throw, finishing ahead of teammates Cynthia Gurecki, who was third, and junior Lauren Farberman, who was fourth. Senior Lisa Brassaw ended the day by finishing first in the 3,000-meter race walk. “I was pleased, our results were about what I expected at this time of year. My intention was to let people just get in the right events and get back into competition mode after so much time off,” Hartwig said.Although the team performed well for its first time out, there is certainly room for improvement. “We definitely have work to do. We’re trying to build on each week and be at our best in late season. It was a good start for us. The competition was good for the first time out this semester, but we’re gonna face teams that are even more complete. It will only get tougher from this point,” Hartwig said.The next test comes this weekend when the team travels to St. Lawrence, the site that will host the conference championships later in the season. “This will be a tough meet. We will have competition that’s gonna be pushing us along, but we will be concentrating on doing what’s best for us,” Hartwig said. Swidler can be reached at dswidler@campustimes.org.