Then luck abandoned the team; on Friday, April 4, the team was all set to compete in the Trinity Invite, but the meet was cancelled at noon that day due to inclement weather and rescheduled for Sunday, April 6, at Springfield College. The weather did not improve much from Friday, as the runners still had to battle the wind and cold.
Women's Track
Officially beginning their season at Conn., the women dominated the other five schools and took home the team win with 170 points. As with all season-opening meets, the day was spent as preparation for later meets, an opportunity for the team members to get their nerves in check.
Coach Erik Nedeau was pleased with the team's performance. "Despite the amount of work that we did this past week and the short amount of time between events, everyone competed extremely well," he said.
The team's focus was on the individual events in this meet. First-years scored many victories and points in the field events. Kristine Morin '06 took first in the javelin, Lyndsey Scott '06 won both the triple and long jump competitions and Ariel Haney '06 won the high jump. In these events, Julia Rucker '06 and Alison Stahl '03 also scored points.
On the track, Ginger Polich '06 won the 800-meter, in front of Alyson Venti '04. Then in the 1500-meter, Venti took second right in front of Polich.
Three women debuted in the 400-meter hurdles with impressive performances. Haney, Monica Westin '05 and Nzingha Tyehemba '06 finished second, third and fourth, respectively. In the 5000-meter run, Erinn White '04 led her teammates, Alison Dimon '03, Jenny Horowitz '06 and Margaret Davis '06 to a sweep of third through sixth place. Immediately following this event, this quartet of women took to the track in the 4 x 100-meter relay and placed third.
Although the event at Springfield College was not scored, the women pulled through with impressive finishes. Sophomore standout Carter Hamill won the 10,000-meter, coming in over two minutes ahead of the second-place finisher. She also placed fourth in the 1500-meter. In the 800-meter run, Jessamyn Conell-Price '06 grabbed a second-place finish, ahead of fourth-place teammate Polich and fifth-place senior tri-captain Kate Hamill. Venti and White took second and fourth place in the 3000-meter race. In the 3000-meter steeplechase, Alison Rodriguez '05 and Helen Dole '04 came in second and third, respectively.
In the jumping events, Rucker and Morin tied for third place in the high jump. Rucker also placed fourth in the triple jump.
Coach Nedeau was disappointed by the impediments the weather. "It throws the training routine for a loop," he said. "both for the current week and the following one. The meet [Sunday] was rather cold and very windy and was not ... well run so we were out there for much longer then I would have liked, and while I thought that the kids competed real well-the times and performances were not truly indicative of the effort due to the weather and constant delays in starting times for events."
Haney commented on the meet, "We didn't even run the 4 x 400-meter relays at the end because the weather was so horrible. We just got out of there."
The team enthusiasm that usually accompanies the meets was not present, as the weather was not conducive to teammates cheering from the sidelines. "Everyone was inside the whole time except when they had to run," remarked Haney. "It was too cold to be outside watching the meet."
Nothing seemed to be going right last Sunday. Haney described her difficult experience in the high jump due to the fact that "the bar kept on being blown off the standards."
Men's Track
The men were successful at the Invite, placing second overall with 114 points. The sole first-place honors on the men's team were won by sophomore Nathaniel Mahlberg in the high hurdles. Mahlberg then went on to take second in the intermediate hurdles.
Many second-place finishes characterized this meet. Alex Lenkoski '03 took second in the steeplechase. In the 4 x 400-meter relay, the quartet of Mahlberg, Brian Hart '03, Dave Molina '05 and Janak Chandrasoma '04 placed second. Then Chandrasoma took his own runner-up honors in the 200-meter.
In the 4 x 100-meter relay, Dave Schreiner '06, Evan Guiney '06, Matthew Katz '05 and Adam David '06 ran to a second-place finish, after each had just run a great season opening time in the 5000-meter run. In the 200-meter dash, first-year Julian Seltzer snatched second place right in front of his twin brother James.
Many points were awarded to the team because of the runners' performance in the 1500-meter and 800-meter. John Stanton-Geddes '04 led the purple men in both events, taking fourth in the 1500-meter and fifth in the 800-meter. Also in the 1500-meter, sophomore Mike Page took fifth place. Meanwhile, Andrew Schneider '03 and Molina helped the team to rack up points.
In the 400-meter, Hart, Devin LoPresti '05 and Matthew Birmingham '05 raced well despite having to combat wind.
In the throwing events, newcomers Bradley Backus '05 and Nicholas Canevari '06 threw well in the shot put and discuss with Backus taking points in both. The sole jumper for the men, junior Julius Nanna won points for the team in both the long jump and in the triple jump.
The men also gave strong performances on Sunday. Jack Morgan '05 led the team with a first-place finish in the 800-meter run. In the 5000-meter, Page grabbed second place just ahead of fifth-place classmate Stanton-Geddes. The 4 x 100-meter relay team came in third, while Nanna completed the triple jump in third place.
"The first two meets have been decent for us but it is early, and it has been very cold, which has made great performances rather difficult," said Nedeau.
Unfortunately it seems that fate is against the team, as the weather carries a great influence on the team's performance. "Running fast in snow and cold weather do not usually go very well together," Nedeau said. "How we do later in the season will depend largely on the weather-if it actually warms up and stops snowing and we can get working on some fast stuff, and then we will be all set. The longer that the weather delays this process, the later in the season that great performances will be pushed back to-similar to last year."
Next week both the men's and women's track teams will compete in the Williams Relays at Williams College before kicking off a series of championship meets in the following weeks.