04/18/08

While many members of the Baker University track and field teams had the weekend to rest, eight athletes competed in two different meets.

Six Wildcats, including sophomores Jackie Koch, Matt James, Kelsey Heckathorne, juniors Chelsey Ornburn and Regan Boyer and senior Alex Reister, took part in the K.T. Woodman Track Classic at Wichita State University in Wichita.

The meet, which was originally scheduled for Saturday, had to be moved to Sunday because of poor weather conditions.

An early start time Sunday and strong winds hurt the team’s efforts, but the Baker athletes managed to showcase their abilities at the meet, head coach Zach Kindler said.

“I would say we did pretty well considering all the circumstances,” he said. “It’s tough when you are ready to go one day and then have to refocus for the next, plus they were fighting a very tough wind, which made it hard in the running events.”

Despite a solid performance from the group, the team had no new national qualifiers.

Ornburn took fourth place in the pole vault.

Koch, who competed in the throwing events, said the condition made it difficult to put up big numbers.

“It was pretty cold on Sunday, so it made it hard to get really loose,” she said. “Overall, we did OK at the meet, but I think on a warmer day we probably would have done at least a little bit better.”

Sophomores Ashlee Miller and Aaron Hannon tested themselves against high-caliber competition at the ESU Open Multi-Event Competition April 10-11 at Emporia State University in Emporia.

Miller competed in the women’s heptathlon.

On the first day of competition, Miller finished third in the 100-meter hurdles, first in the high jump, 14th in the shot put and first in the 200-meter dash.

With a clearance of 1.7 meters in the high jump and a time of 25.38 seconds in the 200, Miller broke two more school records.

Miller managed to escape Emporia with 4,644 total points, the overall title in the women’s heptathlon and a third school record for most points in a heptathlon.

In the men’s decathlon, a competition very similar to the heptathlon but with 10 events, Hannon racked up 5,964 points and finished in 8th place at the ESU meet.

Hannon’s first day total of 3,457 points was the most ever for a Baker decathlete, Kindler said.

“Aaron put up a lifetime best performance, which was great for him,” he said. “He is just going to continue to get better with each meet that he enters.”

Hannon said it was nice to give a good performance despite the weather.

“I was competing against a very good field so it was tough,” he said. “I just wanted to give it everything I had and see what happened. Facing tough competition like this is great preparation for nationals.”

Nine individuals and six relay teams began competing in the Kansas Relays Thursday in Lawrence for the Wildcats, but results were unavailable at presstime.

The Baker track and field team members who did not attend the Kansas Relays will be competing over the weekend at a track meet in Ottawa.