Great Performances Abound as MIT Prepares for NCAA Championships

May 8-9 , 2010

Day one of the two day New England Intercollegiate Amateur Athletic Association (NEICAAA) had the great weather, with near 80 degree temperatures and bright sunshine, and day two had the rain and much cooler temperatures. However, both days provided great competition from teams from all divisions throughout New England.

Despite neither MIT team running their distance runners and Stephen Morton '10, taking the weekend off to prepare for the NCAA Championships in three weeks, both teams placed very well. The men finished sixth overall and the top Division III team with 36 points. The women placed eighth with 37 points, just 3.75 points behind Williams College, the only Division III team ahead of them.

On day one, personal bests came from three individuals. Jamie Simmons '12, in the 400IH ran 62.90 despite decelerating on the first five hurdles due to her steps being off. Lauren Kuntz '13, cleared a new personal best of 10-11 3/4 in the pole vault. Brian Djaja '13, made amends for his DNF last weekend by running a PR of 15.21 in the high hurdles. Along with Simmons qualifying for the finals on Saturday, Portia Jones '12, qualified in the 400 by winning her section in 57.42 and had the fastest qualifying time in the 200, running 24.73, just .03 off her personal best.

Scorers on Friday were led by Vlad Sobes '11, who threw 197-8 in the javelin to place fourth. In the women's pole vault, Karin Fisher '11, earned fifth place by clearing 11-5 3/4. Fisher was over 11-9 3/4 on her first attempt, but failed to push her pole away properly, thus allowing the pole to displace the crossbar. Kuntz placed eighth with her personal best.

Saturday, the day began with a 30 minutes lightning delay. That delay did nothing to derail the day MIT was about to have. Maggie Lloyd '12, got things started with a very well paced and strategically raced 3000 Steeplechase. Racing in the unseeded section, Lloyd continued to knock significant seconds off of her personal best, putting together splits ranging from 88 to 92 seconds to finish second in her section with a 11:19.26, thirty five seconds faster than her best last year.

The women's 4x100 relay was next for MIT. The quartet of Margaret Leibovic '10, Martha Gross '12, Jamie Simmons '12 and Portia Jones '12, needed about .3 seconds faster in order to secure a spot among the 4x100 teams going to the NCAA Division III Championship. However, due to the rain delay, they were not able to get out and check their marks in their respective zones. This was their downfall as each of the three handoffs lost significant time. Nevertheless, showing they were at least ready to run fast, the foursome ran 48.65, matching their second best performance ever. There are still two more opportunities to lower their time.

In the 1500, Yermie Cohen '10, and Jacqui Wentz '10 were making the effort to lower their NCAA qualifying times. Cohen was up first, being fortunate enough to just make it into the fastest section with his 3:51.92 from the week before. Having a sub four minute miler in the field helped as the pace went out fast for the top two runners. The chase group, which Cohen was a part of, was pretty quick as well, going through early splits of 61.4 and 2:02.7. The pace slowed a bit on the third quarter, coming through in 3:05.3. Cohen took the lead on the last lap, running 43 seconds for the final 300, obviously still having something left at the finish. His third place, 3:48.40, is not only an automatic qualifying NCAA Championship performance, but also leads the nation in Division III and is a new MIT record. Wentz was in the second of three sections, just missing the fastest section. Nevertheless, the pace was quick enough to get her the overall time she was looking for, with the first 400 being 72.7, the 800 2:26.5 and the 1200 in 3:39.8. Wentz had the lead in the third quarter, but did not put the competition away. She lost the lead in the final 300, and lacked her usual fight. Nevertheless, she finished in 4:33.00, a much improved time, but probably not fast enough to get into the national field.

Portia Jones was back on the track, representing MIT in the 400. She ran the first 200 a lot more conservatively than usual, putting herself in a great position to race the final 200. Jones pulled into the lead on the home stretch, winning in 56.79, her fastest outdoor performance for the season.

The 800 was next for MIT, and Pat Marx '13, was out to try to qualify for nationals. Not making the fast section meant he would have to push the final 400 the entire way and not be satisfied with just winning his section. The first lap was a solid 55 seconds, but Marx was taking a long time to move up. Finally making a move with 200 to go, Marx began to move up, however it was too little, too late as he was unable to win his section, which went in 1:52.69, which earned second overall. Marx was back at 1:53.62, good for third in his section and sixth overall.

Simmons ran a much cleaner race in the 400IH final, but still decelerated for four of the hurdles and came off one of the hurdles off balance, while still finishing with too much left. All of this indicates she has a lot more left before running the perfect race. Her third place 62.39 was an excellent personal best and moved her up to number two on the NCAA list.

Jones was back on the track in the 200, an event where she was ranked sixth in the country. Jones had a nice start, but with a slight headwind was unable to better her time. She did secure a third place, matching her personal best time of 24.70

The seeded sections of the 3000 Steeplechase were next with Paul Welle also out to move up on the NCAA list. The pace was solid, with the leaders running 4:56 for the 1600. After one more 75 second lap, the pace picked up to 73 seconds and Welle took the lead. However, his failure to negotiate clean water jump attempts gave the eventual winner enough of a gap that Welle could not overcome, but still good enough for second place. Nevertheless, Welle moved up to number seven on the NCAA list and number three on the MIT all-time list with a 9:12.22.

The only remaining running event for MIT was the 4x400. The women had only run 3:54 this season and knew they needed to get serious about running fast. Running in the seeded section put them with the best competition and the foursome took advantage of it. Running in lane one, Simmons was able to see the entire field in front of her, but the three turn stagger made it seem like an insurmountable distance. This did nothing but motivate Simmons as she walked down the field with an excellent 56.7 leadoff leg. A very good handoff to Gross, and an excellent leg of 57.1, put MIT in second place, about ten meters back of first. Kirsten Aarsvold '11, running on the 4x400 for the first time this season, lost ground despite a personal best 60.0 split, finishing in third, approximately 30 meters in back of UNH and another 10 meters behind UMass Lowell. Jones got the baton after Aarsvold failed to place it in her hand the first time and proceeded to make up ground on the leaders. Running 25.8 for the first 200 and blowing past the UNH runner with 120 to go, Jones was now 10 meters back of the leader. She closed another five meters, but could not close the distance, finishing .82 back, running an incredible 54.4 even though she did not sprint through the finish line. The cumulative time of 3:48.62 was an automatic NCAA qualifying mark, destroying the MIT record by three seconds.

In the men's pole vault, Greg Tao '10, placed second on misses with a jump of 15-2 3/4. Cyrus Vafadari '12, cleared 14-2 3/4 to place fifth and Nathan Peterson '12, finished seventh, clearing the same height.

Next week, MIT will continue to try to move individuals up on the NCAA Division III list. Most of those continuing will compete in the ECAC Division III Championship at Springfield College on Thursday and Friday. Stephen Morton and possibly one other will make the trip to the IC4A Championship hosted by Princeton University. Still one or two others may compete at the New Balance Twilite Series meet hosted by UMass Lowell.

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