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https://ucasports.com/news/2021/12/3/womens-track-and-field-bears-break-5-school-records-at-woo-pig-classic.aspx

I was able to be at the meet in Fayetteville.....I would guess most of the athletes that competed were from UCA, UALR and UAPB.....however, pretty good sampling of athletes from Texas A&M, Tulsa and UAF plus some from Ok State, Washington, Minnesota, TCU, Iowa State and numerous unattached former college runners and wannabe pros....for a very early season meet this was pretty good...

The best races (I did not get to see much of the field events) were:

*Men's 600m where a TAM runner ran 1:15+..opened with a 49 400m ..this translates to about a 1:45 800m which is FAST....

* Men's 300m where a TCU runner posted a 33+ clocking which would be about 45 for 400m.....again FAST....

* Men's 5000m where several runners raced in a small pack and seemed to pick the pace up every 200-300m after the first mile until the winner from Tulsa took off with 400m to go and won in 13:40.....very good early time....

* Women's 3000m where a small group raced close together until the winner form Ok State took with 800m left and won in a very nice 8:58..probably a NCAA indoor qualifying time...

* Women's 5000m where a small group from UAF, Washington and Minnesota raced together for about 2 miles then a UAF and Washington runner set a gap on the others and finally with about 1000m to go the UAF runner went off and no ne followed to win in 15:34...Top 4 all under 16 minutes....probably a couple of NCAA qualifying times...

Having said that, the short sprints and hurdles were very competitive with several near qualifying times and a lot of good times....

So, how did UCA do? The UCA news article sums up the meet for both teams but what caught my eye were:

* Jaron Hamilton ran a very nice mile and ended up racing a TAM runner to the end but got 2nd in 4:11.....potential here for a 4:05 indoor mile.....

* Wesley Suen was 15th in the M60 dash but at a fast 6.96.....it usually takes about 6.60 to make NCAAs but this had a lot of good times with 17 under 7.00....Suen will have to knock off a few tenths to get to NCAAs but looking good for ASUM meet....

* Laila Cleare and Kendelle McCoy took 7th and 8th in a stacked W60m dash field and looked very impressive at 7.69 and 7.71...the race was won by former a UAF runner who was All-SEC (and maybe AA) at 7.25...pretty good for two FR!!

* Tristan Lavan was 9th in 1:19.31 for the 600m...about a 1:49 for 800m...excellent for early season indicates maybe very competitive at ASUN.....long shot for NCAAs but not out of reach...

* Jaiden Ventour ran 34.06 in the 300m dash for 6th and a FR Bear ran in the 34s also...these are about 47 for 400m..not going to make NCAAs at that but very good for ASUn and really helpful for 4x400 relay team..

* Tyler Rose was 11th in W300m at 39.79..maybe 54 or better for 400…..3 other SugarBears were in low 41s.....Rose later ran on the 4x400 team that got 5th in 3:48.....she is a smooth 400m runner with power.....3:48 will have to come down but should for ASUN...takes mid 3:30s to get to NCAAs...which is about 52-53 for 400m.....probably a stretch.....

* The top Bears and SugarBears distance runners other than the two in the M1000m did not compete ....however, the 1000m crew was strong....Jesse Applewhite was 12th in 2:28.34 and Niklas Iking 13th in 2:28.68……they came from back to win their heat…..both looked very strong and in control….wish they had been in the following heat with Iowa State and Ok State runners....these times imply about 4:05 for the mile now.....maybe lower with a few more weeks of training....some day we will have a 4 minute miler....

Overall good meet and the Bears and SugarBears competed well against some pretty good SEC and Big 12 athletes....

1/14/22 @ UAF for Arkansas Invitational

A good indoor meet at a great facility with plenty of competition.....expect regional schools like Tulsa, Ok State, OU plus normally some good junior college athletes as well as the Arkansas D1s....good early checkpoint for Bears and SugarBears....

Driving by campus the other day I saw our crew out running. Love the effort!

Well they certainly compete hard...I was at the meet in Fayetteville and did not see any really top marks but great effort and competing....I think we may have held out a few.....Niklas Iking (not our top 800 runner) ran a very good race against the 2/3s from Ok State and Arkansas and all ran about 1:53....they had to really race hard to beat him....he also anchored the 4x4 relay in about 49...

Anyone who went to the meet was treated to a terrific men's mile as an Ok State runner won in sub 3:59....I will never get tired of seeing sub4 minute miles....we have a couple Bears who have that potential but not yet quite there....Go Bears and SugarBears!!

Good weekend for Bears on the track...

SR Alex Hanson won 3000m run at Fayetteville in 8:27....best ever by a Bear...certainly not ideal conditions in the wind and cold...

JR Michael Angelo Bullard was 2nd in men's javelin with new school record of 206' 4"...

Then the big new record at Lee University (Cleveland, TN) as SR Julian Haessner took 5th in the 10,000m run in 29:41.07 to be the first Bear ever to clock below 30 minutes....twin brother SR Phillip was 14th with a very respectable 30:13.70....both well below 5 minutes per mile...old record was Albert Maeder in 2016 at 30:53.....so Julian and Phillip are now 1-2 on the best ever list....this puts Julian 45th on the NCAA D1 West performance list....Phillip at #62...probably not enough to qualify for nationals but still very good and maybe another chance to run the event before ASUN meet and get a better time....

4/22-23/22.....UCA at Tuscaloosa for Alabama home meet.....mostly some of the better non-SEC regional programs had teams and athletes competing in addition to Bama and Mizzou....Auburn, Tennessee, Ole Miss, Miss State and Florida State had athletes also....Kennesaw State from the ASUN out up some very solid marks...

https://live.pttiming.com/?mid=4896

Excellent times at Bama....SR Alex Hanson won Section 2 of the 1500m in a very fast 3:46.69 which is just a tiny bit shy of a sub-4 mile pace.....getting that milestone will be a big day for the UCA distance program.....I suspect had Hanson been in Section 1 he would have gotten it as that was a race with 11 runners between 3:41 and 3:46.....

Julian Haessner finished 5th overall in the 5000m run in 14:26.52 which is very near the sub-14 minute pace which is another distance milestone time....

Both Hanson and Haessner set new UCA records....

Numerous other very good marks for new UCA records below.....

Women's 4x100 relay, the UCA team of Ciara Tucker, Kendelle McCoy, Talayssia Sanders, and Laila Cleare placed 5th with a time of 45.88, beating the previous time by 0.34.

Men's 4x100 relay, UCA Team A consisting of Kobe Gill, Tristan LaVan, Johnson Adegbite, and Emmanuel Olie placed 5th with a time of 40.25, beating the previous time by 0.22.

Women's 400m, Tyler Rose placed 4th with a time of 55.10, beating the previous record held by her by 0.41.

Michaelangelo Bullard placed 4th in the men's Javelin Throw with a personal record throw of 65.65m (215' 5").

https://ucasports.com/news/2022/4/22/womens-track-and-field-day-1-of-crimson-tide-invitational-complete.aspx

https://ucasports.com/news/2022/4/24/womens-track-and-field-bears-break-4-more-records-at-crimson-tide-invitational.aspx


Looks like this next weekend there will be split squads with some at Memphis and some at the Penn Relays at historic Franklin Filed in downtown Philly....