This past Saturday, the Men's Track Team visited Tufts for the New England Division III Championships. MIT, seeded 3rd behind Williams College, and Springfield College, finished where expected, 1 1/2 points ahead of Wheaton College.

MIT began the day behind because of the Decathlon results from Thursday and Friday. Williams scored 10 for first place and Springfield garnered 6 for 3rd in that event. Bowdoin College was leading with 12 points after finishing 2nd and 4th, but they did not have enough top entries to break into the top 3 teams.

The trials began well for Tech. In the High Hurdles, both Lincoln Bonner '97 and Ravi Sastry '98 advanced to the finals after placing 1st and 3rd in their heat. Matt Sandholm '97, having not run the 100 since March 29th due to a pulled hamstring, was just hoping to finish the race. However, he to qualified for the finals by finishing 3rd in his heat of the 100 Meters. The only other trial that Tech runners were entered in was the 400 Meters. Neal Karchem '99, seeded 8th in the race, came from behind in the home stretch to place 4th and advance to the finals with a season best of 51.01.

The first final was the Long Jump. Although Tech had four qualifiers in the event, only Dafe Ogagan '97 was seeded to place. The jumping was not going well for anyone, including MIT. Bonner and Sastry were in the first flight which conflicted with the High Hurdle Trials. Ravi did not make the finals, but Bonner did. In the 2nd flight, Morio Alexander 'G fouled his first two jumps, either of which would have probably have gotten him a 2nd place. On his final attempt he qualified for the finals and was sitting in 5th place. Dafe qualified on his first jump and was in 6th place with his 20-06 1/2 effort. In the finals nothing changed as far as place was concerned, but Dafe landed poorly, tearing his cartilage in his knee, and ending his season

Next were the High Jump and Pole Vault. Ravi was entered in the High Jump, but failed to make the starting height. Dafe was seeded 2nd in the Pole Vault and many thought he had a chance to win and qualify for the NCAA Championships. Without him the other four Tech vaulters who had qualified for the event, but were not seeded to score, needed to step up. Andrew Jamieson '99, accepted the challenge and finished 2nd with a vault of 13-09, his best of the season. Other Tech vaulters in the event were Sam Thibault '00 (12-09), Mike DeMassa '97 (12-03), and Matt Potts '00 (12-03).

The 400 Relay was the first final in the running events during the afternoon schedule. MIT was seeded 6th, but that was with either Sandholm or Ogagan anchoring the team, neither of which was able to run. John Kim '98, the designated alternate, filled in nicely, taking the baton from Karchem in a great exchange and brought it home in 6th place for 1 point. Brad Geilfuss 'G, and Bonner '97 were the first two legs of the relay and put MIT in great position early.

The premier event for Tech was to be the 3000 Meter Steeplechase. Leif Seed '99 and Mike Parkins '99, both having qualified for Nationals in the event, were seeded 1 and 2 respectively. Leif had been injured for a week and a half, and entered the race doubting his ability to race well. His lack of confidence showed when after the mile mark he began to fade. Parkins ran on by himself, winning easily in 9:21.84, despite hitting the last water jump and going head first into the pit. Leif faded badly, but held onto 5th with a time of 9:37.15.

Next up was the 110HH. Bonner seeded 1st, was hoping to complete his undefeated season. Lincoln had an unusually good start, but had trouble on the 3rd and 4th hurdles. He fell behind, caught up a little late in the race, but finished 2nd in 15.51. Sastry, running the event for the 1st time since Spring Break because of injury, finished 5th in 15.93.

Karchem scored in the 400 as a freshman after being seeded out of the top 10. This year he hoped to do the same, however the field pulled away at the start. Neal came back on the homestretch, but could not make up the difference and finished 8th with a 51.07.

Sandholm finished the trials, but could he finish the finals. Everyone member of the MIT Team hoped Matt would finish and fare well, but few thought he would. Running fast for the first time in nearly 2 months, Matt could not get in the groove, but he did finish and placed 5th in 11.10 for 2 big unexpected points.

MIT had two entries in the 800, and both Edgar Ngwenya 'G, and Joel Ford '98 were in the fast section, seeded 7th and 8th. The first section went out hard and finished in 1:56. Being aware of the times from the first section, the 2nd section went out hard in 54 seconds for the 400 split. Ford stayed with the group until the homestretch where he faded a bit, but held on for 6th place in a personal best of 1:55.44. Ngwenya, injured for the past month with a sore hip flexor, could not hold onto the fast pace and faded badly in the last lap.

Going back to the field events, Alexander was trying to find the take-off board in the Triple Jump. Morio had foul problems, but got in a legal jump to put in 4th going into the finals. Morio finally got a decent leap in on his final attempt and moved up to 2nd with a 44-02 1/2 effort. Sam Thibault, also in the event, could not get approach down and fouled out of the event.

With two event to go, MIT was in 5th place. Chris McGuire '00 was seeded 7th in the 5000 Meters, but he and Coach Taylor knew he was capable of much more. Chris planned on holding onto the pack, regardless of pace until he felt confident he could outkick them. He planned the race and raced the plan. Coming through average mile splits of 4:43, 9:35, and 14:19, Chris blasted past the leaders with 600 meters to go and won going away with a national qualifying performance of 14:50.26. Chris covered the final 600 meters in 1:35 in route to setting a new freshman record.

All MIT had to do to finish in 3rd place was not let Wheaton or Tufts beat them by any more than 7 1/2 points in the 1600 Meter Relay. Wheaton College had qualified for Nationals in this relay Indoors, but thus far had failed to do so Outdoors. Running up front until the final leg, Wheaton got passed by Williams coming into the home stretch and finished 2nd. MIT only needed to place 6th to secure 3rd place. Bonner led off with a conservative leg in 52.3. Martin Suresh '99 was too competitive in the first 200 meters, fatiguing in the home stretch, and finishing with a 52.2 split. Dan Helgesen '97 ran a superb leg of 51.0 after a poor baton exchange, passing two teams and putting Tech into the thick of the race. Karchem ran his best anchor leg of the season when he needed to. He finished with a 50.2 split and brought the baton home in 5th place, securing the 3rd place trophy.

Next week are the All New England Championships at Northeastern University. Entered in that meet are Alexander in the Long and Triple Jumps, Ford in the 800 Meters, Bonner in the High Hurdles, McGuire in the 5000, and Seed and Parkins in the Steeplechase. Others have qualified, but have decided to let their injuries heal and get ready for final exams.