The UConn Track & Field team was back in action for two meets this past weekend. After breaking into the top 10 in many records last week, more personal bests and program records were shattered over the weekend.
The competition began at the John Thomas Terrier Classic Invite on Friday. The Huskies sent a handful of women to compete against some of the best collegiate runners in the country.
In the one-mile run, reigning Big East Women’s Track Athlete of the Week Jenna Zydanowicz kept the momentum from last week going into Friday’s race. Zydanowicz’s time of 4:39.78 was 21st out of almost 200 runners.
Connecticut had six runners in the 3,000-meter run. In a stacked field, five of the six runners finished in under ten minutes, while Caroline Webb just missed this mark, running a 10:02.79. Malin Rahm had the best time for UConn, followed by Chole Trudel. Both runners ran sub-nine minutes and 45 seconds. Rachel Woodruff and Claire Paci went stride for stride and finished in 75th and 77th place, respectively. Rounding out the competition was Loghan Hughes, coming in 90th with a time of 9:55.98.
UConn played host to the Coach Greg Roy-Al Rumble on Saturday with six teams from the Northeast participating. Joining the Huskies were Eastern Connecticut State, Southern Connecticut State, University of Albany, UMass Lowell and the Yale Bulldogs.
Connecticut started the morning by going one and two in the women’s pentathlon. Audrey Kozak was the overall winner after winning the 60-meter hurdles, high jump and long jump. Mackenzie Braunstein came in second, winning the 800-meter race.
In the women’s pole vault, UConn had three finishes inside the top four. Rachel Mason got second place after a season best of 12 feet 2.5 inches. Freshman Abby Bernas and senior Mallory Malz closely followed Mason. Both athletes cleared 11 feet 8.5 inches, a personal best for Bernas.
The women continued their dominance in the field events by going one and two in shot put. Gabriela DeFelice blew away the competition with a personal best throw of over 44 feet. Sinclaire Fryer’s toss put her in a comfortable second place, a foot ahead of Makayla Harris of Yale.
In the men’s pole vault, Ty Noble tied Gabe Snyder of UAlbany for second place. Freshman Kyle Kurtz came in fifth with a personal best of 14 feet 3.25 inches. Max Ringwall also cleared the same distance as Kurtz on Saturday.
Travis Roux won the men’s weight throw outright, winning by seven inches. The senior’s personal best throw traveled 67 feet 7 inches.
Kyle Johnson rounded out the men’s field events by winning the men’s triple jump. His monster jump of 52 feet 8.75 inches is a school record and good for the 10th best jump in all of Division 1 Track & Field this year.
Natalia Surdej finished the women’s field events off with a second-place finish in the weight throw. The senior lost to Stephanie Green of UAlbany by less than four inches.
Three Huskies qualified for the finals in the women’s 60-meter dash. Jaia James won in a photo-finish against Adaliz Hunt of UAlbany. The junior’s personal record time of 7.55 seconds was a hundredth of a second better than Hunt’s. Danielle Phillip had a season best sprint of 7.74 seconds, good for third place. Sarah Claflin went 7.85 after qualifying with a time of 7.82 seconds.
In the men’s 60-meter dash, UConn finished top one and two in the prelims and then swept the podium in the finals. Damon Simpson and Noble Gongon both had season-best runs, while Nicholas Wright had a personal best sprint of 6.89 seconds.
A’liyah Thomas finished in second place for the 60-meter hurdles. The senior finished in 8.53 seconds during the finals.
Four UConn hurdlers qualified for the men’s 60-meter hurdles final. Terrel Williams took first in both the prelims and the finals, tying his school record for best 60-meter hurdles time at 7.7 seconds. Donovan Wright edged out teammate Jordon Quinn for third place. Quinn set a new personal best of 8.36 seconds. Michael Johnson finished in seventh place in the finals as well.
Connecticut went one and two once again on Saturday, this time in the men’s 600 meters. Freshman duo Gabriel Cuffey and Del Lindsay had impressive days on the track, both finishing with a time under one minute and 24 seconds.
Ending the day in the women’s 1000 meter, Madison Relyea broke three minutes for a second-place finish, while Allison McCarthy had a comfortable third place positioning.
The Huskies will once again double up in meets next week. The Crimson Elite will be held on Friday at Harvard, followed by the Bruce Lehane Scarlett and White Invite at Boston University. Live results for these meets can be found on lancertiming.com.