Last weekend, the men’s and women’s track teams headed to Bates and Southern Maine University, respectively, for the New England Division III Championship meets. Owen Kiely ’06 and Jon King ’07 paced the men’s squad, while Ellen Davis ’07 was up to her old tricks, breaking two more team records.
The men’s meet resulted in a mix of performances. Kiely turned in an eighth-place finish in the mile. Although he typically runs longer distances, Kiely was attempting to step down the distance and improve his foot speed in preparation for nationals, where he’ll compete in the longer and more strength-oriented 5k.
Kiely tried put pressure on the other runners early, but the other runners started slow, and the tactical race left him without much push at the end.
“I just didn’t have the gears,” Kiely said. “At the moment my aerobic strength and foot speed are a little out of proportion, which is something coach and I are trying to work on in the next three weeks prior to nationals.”
Meanwhile, King ran a strong race and finished eighth in the 3k. The most encouraging run of the day for the Cards was their fourth-place showing in the distance medley.
The relay team consisted of Chris Foster ’09, Kenton Atta-Krah ’09, Brad Litchfield ’09, and Kiely. In general, though, the men’s team turned out a modest performance.
“I think a lot of us are pretty disappointed with the weekend,” Kiely said. “But everyone runs the occasional sub-par race and if you want to be successful as a runner you need to learn from your shortcomings rather than let them rattle your confidence.”
The Cards underperformed, but the team did not blame physical preparation.
“As Coach Curry said to us afterwards: perhaps a few of our problems over the weekend were mental,” Atta-Krah said.
Other members of the team echoed Atta-Krah.
“All of our guys are in top shape right now and ready to drop school records,” King said. “We just need to get it together mentally, as that is such a huge component to competing well in the upper echelon of the sport week after week. Our guys are tough and we’re going to see some exciting things in the upcoming weeks.”
Over at Southern Maine, the women’s team was putting on a much more explosive performance. Davis, a model of excellence on the track, added another chapter to her impressive career. She broke two team records that she had set herself a year ago, coming in with a time of 5:02.12 in the mile, breaking her previous best by 1.71 seconds, and 9:52.96 in the 3k to break her previous mark by 1.59 seconds.
Davis was not the only Card to star over the weekend. The Cardinals came ready to attack the 600m race, and did so with much success. Lisa Sussman ’09 ran the 600 for the first time and finished with an impressive time of 1.39.03, breaking the school record and finishing seventh.
The record was not long-lived, however. Steph O’Brien ’08, who was the top seed in the 600m, broke the record again almost immediately after with a time of 1.38.21, good enough for fifth overall. The previous record was a time of 1:40.25, set in 1999.
“This was probably the best meet of the season in terms of my own personal performance,” Sussman said. “For two golden minutes I held that school record, it felt great.”
O’Brien was similarly pleased.
“I felt excited about the possibility of placing first,” O’Brien said. “But my main goal was the break the school record. While I didn’t place as well as I had hoped, I was thrilled to break the record and hope to break the 500m record next weekend at BU.”
Overall the team was happy with their performance.
“Even though it was just a small group of us we went into the meet with a lot of spirit, focus, and motivation,” O’Brien said. “The women performed well on the whole. While we didn’t score as well as we might have due, at least in part, to some tricky maneuvering by other teams, everyone ran with a lot of guts.”
Up next for both teams is the New England Open meet at Dartmouth, which will be held Feb. 23 and 24.
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