The women's and men's track teams competed in the ECAC and IC4A championships, respectively, this past weekend in Boston. The season-ending meet featured more qualifiers than ever before, with 16 women and 12 men competing for Duke.
The women finished 14th and the men 18th overall, and two individual runners each earned two silvers. Sheela Agrawal and Sean Kelly both finished second in their respective 5,000-meter races.
"We sent the most athletes Duke has ever had," men's coach Norm Ogilvie said. "We had the best individual season by virtue of just getting up to this meet."
Agrawal, who had not run a race since December due to illness and injuries, broke her own Duke record Saturday in the 5,000-meter dash with a time of 16:29.54. Sunday, she broke away with a second-place finish, which will most likely earn her a spot in the NCAA Championships next weekend.
Janay McKie broke two school records in the 60-meter dash, recorded a time of 7.60 in the prelims and 7.57 in the semis. She finished fourth in the finals, with a time of 7.67. McKie did not qualify for the finals in the 200-meter run, however, though she ran a time of 24.91.
"I was pretty pleased with my performance," McKie said. "It was big for me because I've been working throughout the season to get to my ultimate goal, which was to make the finals. It was good to see my hard work paid off."
Graduate student Megan Sullivan placed fifth in Sunday's 1,000-meter run, after running the fourth-fastest time in Duke's history with 2:53.02. Jodi Schlesinger placed eighth in the triple jump, at 39 feet, eight inches.
"I told the athletes that if they perform at the level they had to in order to get into this meet, they would more than likely score in the meet," womens' coach Jan Ogilvie said. "The level of the meet can be higher or lower in any one year, you just don't know."
On the mens' side of the track, eight athletes qualified for Sunday's finals.
Sean Kelly broke his own Duke record en route to a second-place finish in the 5,000-meter run Sunday, with a time of 14:17.90. Kelly earned All-East honors, in what was the highest finish by a Duke runner in the IC4As since 1971. In the other heat of the same race, Michael Hatch set a Duke freshman record by finishing in 14:37.39, to place ninth overall.
Freshman Nick Schneider recorded the second fastest mile in Duke history Saturday, with a time of 4:07.40, to advance him to Sunday's race. He ended up placing eighth overall in the finals.
Brent Warner placed fourth in the pole vault with 4.90 meters. The 4x 800-meter relay team, whose Sunday lineup featured Bill Spierdowis, Ian Cronin, Wells and Schneider, ended up fifth overall. Their time of 7:33.57 was the second fastest in Duke history.
"I think it's safe to say that it was the best combined team finish ever at this meet," Ogilvie said. "It was great that both the men and women finished in the top 18."
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