CORTLAND, N.Y. – The Cortland women's outdoor track and field team recorded six victories, including a historic performance by Autumn Pittman (Spring Valley/Ramapo), at the Cortland Red Dragon Open on Sunday.
 
Pittman won the 100-meter dash, out of 27 competitors, in 11.96 seconds, which is the best Fully Automatic Timing (FAT) mark in the event in school history. Tracey Armstead is listed in the school record books with an FAT time of 12.01 seconds in the event in 1983 and a hand time of 11.7 seconds (which converts to 11.94 FAT) in 1982. Pittman's effort ranks sixth nationally in Division III this season, as of Sunday evening.
 
Pittman also placed first of 32 in the 200-meter dash in 25.18 seconds, which ranks 26th nationally, and she anchored the winning 4x100-meter relay team, that also featured Kendall Sobczyk (Wheatfield/Niagara Wheatfield), Alexia Prince (Spring Valley/Clement Howell) and Avery Hebert (Stillwater), that finished in 48.35 seconds. All of the above performances are AARTFC qualifiers.
 
Danielle Fisk (Honeoye Falls/Honeoye Falls-Lima) won the 100-meter hurdles in an AARTFC time of 14.90 seconds. AnJalyna Talmadge (Pine Bush) was second in 15.73 seconds. In the 100-meter dash, Sobczyk posted an AARTFC time of 12.50 seconds to finish second and Prince was third in 12.62 seconds, and Prince was runner-up to Pittman in the 200-meter dash in 25.93 seconds.
 
Hannah McMasters (Homer) finished first of 22 in the hammer throw at 47.94 meters (157' 3) and Jennifer Ndukwu (Queens/Metropolital Expeditionary Learning School) was second at 45.47 meters (149' 2"), both AARTFC marks. Hebert won the 400-meter dash in 1:00.30 and Maris Seabury (Old Chatham/Ichabod Crane) was second in 1:02.10.
 
Both Fisk and Regan Kaiser (Queensbury/Glens Falls) met the AARTFC standard in the high jump - Fisk was second at 1.60 meters (5' 3") and Kaiser cleared 1.57 meters (5' 1.75") to place third. Three Cortland runners qualified for the AARTFC meet in the 5,000 meters. Alexa Wolcott (Wyoming/Pavilion) placed second in 18:26.19, followed by Devin Reilly (Irvington) in third (18:26.60) and Melissa Innocent (Elmont/Valley Stream North) in fourth (18:29.60). Cortland also had an AARTFC qualifying performance in the 4x400-meter relay as Seabury, Matty Lucey (Freeville/Groton), Yasmine Peralta (Monroe/Monroe-Woodbury) and Hebert finished second in 4:05.22.
 
Peralta finished second in the 400-meter hurdles (1:09.04). Caitlin Maher (Hartsdale/Ardsley) finished second in the triple jump (10.38 meters/34' 0.75"), followed by Matteson Donnelly (Pearl River) in third (10.29 meters/33' 9.25"). Sydney Smith (Greenville) was third of 32 in the 1,500 meters (5:02.47) and Fisk placed third in the javelin throw (25.84 meters/84' 9").

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

We're very fortunate to have such an excellent facility to host meets at, and we were extra fortunate this weekend that we were able to have our timing company, officials, and (nearly all of) our invited teams able to move until Sunday as the weather was much more favorable today. Obviously the support from our department to make this happen was pretty darn important as well! While I wouldn't call the weather conditions today great track and field, they certainly weren't bad, and we had a number of folks take advantage of the opportunity!
 
There were a number of very strong performances from the throwers today! Evan Collette moved up to #4 all-time on the hammer throw list, while teammate Nick Kaires also moved up to #4 in our all-time discus throw list. Jennifer Ndukwu moved up a spot in our all-time list in the hammer throw; while Hannah McMasters overtook the #3 spot in the same event. We had a number of strong performances from both squads in the discus throw and shot put as well; I'll commend Ryan Joule in particular as we were focusing on a very specific aspect of his javelin throw which meant he was only 'allowed' to do 3 steps as compared to what we think his normal approach will be of 9 – 11 steps. To throw as far as he did with that limitation is pretty stellar; more importantly it seems as though he really achieved what we were trying to do with his technique on the day.
 
We saw a lot of great progress in the jumps for both genders, with Matteson Donnelly, Caitlin Maher, and Hayden Erick as our strongest performers across multiple events. On the track, we had a number of strong performances out of the distance squad, with some exceptional team efforts in both the women's and then men's 5k. Devin Reilly in particular had a great breakthrough in the 5k, which probably had a lot to do with the great pacing efforts from teammates Melissa Innocent and Alexa Wolcott.
 
While the wind played a lot of havoc with the 200, 400, and 400 hurdles, it didn't stop Autumn Pittman from tying the #5 all-time performance at Cortland in the 200, after opening up the day with a great anchor leg in the 4x100 and breaking the 12 second barrier in the 100! We saw some really strong performances in the 100 especially from Alexia Prince and Gianna Motto, as well as from Brandon Levin who dropped under the 11-second barrier for the first time ever. We had similar strong efforts in the high hurdles, especially from Aaron Jones, Roland Zanger, and Danielle Fisk. It's also worth noting that our men's 4x100 relay opened up their season with the #3 performance all-time at Cortland.
 
While we didn't get the times we wanted from the most of the folks today in the 200. 400, and 400 hurdles, there were nearly all good efforts by this group, so there is a lot to be pleased with!
 
This upcoming week will be exciting, as we will get to see at least a couple of days of good weather leading into both our meet at Bucknell on Saturday and Sunday as well as the 'Upstate Alternative' at home, scheduled for Saturday.