SHIPPENSBURG, PA. and ITHACA, N.Y. – The Cortland women's outdoor track and field team competed at both the Shippensburg Paul Kaiser Classic on Saturday and at the Cornell Big Red Invitational on Sunday.
 
Shippensburg Highlights:
 
Cortland recorded three AARTFC qualifying times at the meet. The 4x100-meter relay team of Kendall Sobczyk (Wheatfield/Niagara Wheatfield), Alexia Prince (Spring Valley/Clement Howell), Faith Nelson (Rensselaer/Columbia) and Autumn Pittman (Spring Valley/Ramapo) finished third in 49.64 seconds. Pittman placed third in the 200-meter dash in 25.68 seconds and was third in the 100-meter dash prelims in 12.34 seconds. She did not run in the 100-meter finals.
 
Avery Hebert (Stillwater) finished fifth (1:00.23) and Maris Seabury (Old Chatham/Ichabod Crane) finished eighth (1:01.59) in the 400-meter dash. Regan Kaiser (Queensbury/Glens Falls) and Reilly Quinn (Beekmantown) each cleared 1.55 meters (5' 1") in the high jump, with Kaiser officially tied for fifth and Quinn ninth.
 
Three Red Dragons finished in the top eight out of 67 competitors in the 1,500 meters. Alexa Wolcott (Wyoming/Pavilion) placed sixth in 4:55.33, Melissa Innocent (Elmont/Valley Stream North) was seventh in 4:55.52 and Sydney Smith (Greenville) finished eighth in 4:56.56. Matty Lucey (Freeville/Groton) finished eighth in the 400-meter hurdles (1:09.96).
 
Cornell Highlights:
 
Three Red Dragons hit AARTFC marks at Cornell. Deirdre Sullivan (Tappan/Tappan Zee) finished second in the 3,000-meter steeplechase in 11:49.07, Danielle Fisk (Honeoye Falls/Honeoye Falls-Lima) was fourth in the high jump at 1.62 meters (5' 3.75") and Jennifer Ndukwu (Queens/Metropolitan Expeditionary Learning School) was sixth in the hammer throw (48.99 meters/160' 8").
 
In addition, Fisk placed third in the javelin (31.83 meters/104' 5") and Hannah McMasters (Homer) was fifth in the discus (33.44 meters/109' 8").

Coach's Corner - Comments from Cortland Head Coach Steve Patrick:

This was a long and exciting weekend for the track and field program!
 
The Paul Kaiser Classic at Shippensburg on Saturday is normally a great chance to run fast – good weather, fast track, and good competition. Well, two out of three ain't bad! Mother Nature wasn't at her kindest, but we certainly had people take advantage of the opportunity anyways. Our high jump crew was very mentally tough to jump under less than ideal conditions – for the men, it was steady rain and not even 50 degrees, yet both Roland Zanger and Logan Buchanan showed a lot of poise and toughness; while the rain had stopped for the ladies it was still cold and wet, yet both Regan Kaiser and Reilly Quinn jumped well and more importantly competed tough!
 
Aidan Garafola had a great day to PR in the 400, and while the times didn't show it, I thought that both Gianna Motto and Zion Chetham ran exceptional 200-meter races today. Being able to perform in those less-than-ideal conditions is valuable as we move into championship season! I'll also commend Austin Garske on running his best 400-hurdle race of the season in terms of managing his step pattern and staying smooth. That's a huge accomplishment heading into the SUNYAC meet this weekend!
 
Our mid-distance folks had quite a day! In the men's 800 5 guys ran a season's best; Hector Ramos probably wins the gold star for the best run; 10 of our folks set season's bests in the 1500; for this event the highlight has to be Alexa Wolcott and Melissa Innocent who were so far out in front of their heat running only against each other that they lapped some competitors, both powering home to big PRs of 4:55!
 
Cornell's meet on Sunday was certainly quite a bit warmer for the first half of the meet, and a large number of folks took advantage of the opportunity! Combined-event athletes John Anderson, Danielle Fisk, and AnJalyna Talmadge all had a range of good performances across a slew of events as we prepare for this weekend's combined event. Kevin Andreski jumped himself into the SUNYAC meet with a big PR in the triple jump, and Faith Hoyt moved up in the rankings in the pole vault with her new PR. It was great to see both sophomores come through with big performances.
 
In the throws, there were a lot of strong highlights. Jennifer Ndukwu posted a new PR in the hammer throw, moving up a spot in the all-time performance list. Tommy Burek (shot put and hammer throw) and Cabe Hogue (shot put and discus throw) both had double season's bests, leading a strong contingent of Red Dragon throwers to new season or personal records!
 
As with Saturday, we saw some exceptional results in the middle-distances. Deirdre Sullivan ran a solo effort to break the 12-minute mark in the steeplechase following as gnarly fall on a barrier early in the race. Getting up and continuing was impressive; setting a new PR was downright stellar. Mia Hannan and Sophie Marra both set new PRs in the 1500 by over 10 seconds for the 2nd meet in a row. If you are decent at math, you know that both of these ladies have now set new personal bests by over 20 seconds in the past week. That was outstanding to see!
 
This week – our final week of classes for the semester – is pretty low-key in terms of training as we prepare for the upcoming conference championships!