Walker takes 60 meter hurdles and long jump
WHITEWATER, Wis. – The Northern Michigan track and field team competed at the Karl Schlender Invitational this weekend where the team finished with five individual first-place finishes and two team victories. In addition, the ‘Cats had nine podium finishers and an additional nine top-five finishers.
Northern’s victories came from Crystal Walker in the 60m hurdles and the long jump, Beverly Harper in the 600m, Lana Mac in the 800m, Lamar Gordon in the mile run, and the 4×200 and 4×400 relay teams.
Overall, the Wildcats showed incredible depth across a wide variety of events and were highlighted by standout performances in hurdles, long jump, distance running and relay running.
Track Events
NMU had four runners in the top-10 in the mile run. The Wildcats were led by Lamar Gordon in first with a time of 5:03.62. Just behind Gordon were Ella Debruyn in third with a time of 5:09.64 which was her PR, Ashley Choponis finished in fourth with a time of 5:13.49, Sophia Potter was in seventh place with a time of 5:15.90 which was also a PR.
The Wildcats finished in first place out of four teams with a time of 1:46.00 in the 4×200 relay where Macyn DellAngelo, Baux Truckey, Lily Phillips and Kanya Campbell led the team to the victory.
In the 600m, Beverly Harper won the race with a time of 1:38.13 which was her personal best.
In the 60m hurdle finals, Crystal Walker and Lily Phillips finished in first and second place respectively with times of 9.05 and 9.29.
In the 60m dash, Baux Truckey finished in second place with a time of 7.90.
The Wildcats had two podium finishers in the 800m as Lana Mac finished in first place with a time of 2:22.75 and Lola Korpi came in third at 2:25.34. Brooke Lemos came in eighth place with a time of 2:36.31.
In the 2000m, the Wildcats swept second through eighth places as they were paced by Madi Szymanski with a time of 10:26.53. Notably, Ella DeBruyn (10:41.33) who finished in fourth place and Celia Wallace (10:56.06) who finished in seventh, both got PR’s.
In the 4×400, NMU finished in first place as their team of Lola Korpi, Paige Anderson, Maija Maki-Warne and Beverly Harper finished with a time of 4:11.30.
Field Events
In the shot put, NMU was led by two top-5 finishers as Danielle Lund threw 11.92m and Alizabeth Little threw 11.71m.
NMU had three top-5 finishers in the long jump as Crystal Walker won gold with a distance of 5.38m, Natasha Nowakoski finished in third and got a distance of 4.75m and Mikayla de Souza finished in fifth place with a PR distance of 4.75m.
In the triple jump, the ‘Cats had three in the top ten as Alayna Vandegriff finished in fifth with a distance of 10.39m, Allison Schinke finished in eighth with a distance of 10.24m and Gabi Lainhart finished in tenth with a distance of 9.66m.
NMU was led by Eva Zonca and Elizabeth Simpson in the high jump who tied for 8th with a distance of 1.46m.
In the pole vault, Alyssa Tumminaro led the way in 4th place with a 3.05m clearance. Alayna Vandergriff finished in 7th place with 2.90m.
Up Next
Next week, the Wildcats will travel downstate to University Center for the Jets Pizza Invite hosted by Saginaw Valley State University beginning with the first of two days on Friday, January 30th.
