The Hillsdale College men and women’s track team finished fifth at the Miami University Invitational in Oxford, Ohio.
“As we move forward to an elite program we will be able to continue competing against those [Div. I] programs,” women’s head coach Andrew Towne said.
Senior Amanda Putt also had the opportunity over the weekend to compete against other elite athletes at the Stanford Invitational in Palo Alto, Calif., where she automatically qualified for the outdoor national track meet in the 1,600-meter run and provisionally qualified in the 800-meter run.
Her teammates in Ohio, meanwhile, had six athletes provisionally qualify for nationals, as well as several personal records.
The men’s team finished with a total of 77 points. Freshman Joshua Mirth finished second in the 10,000-meter run in 31:58.16. Senior Jeff Wysong finished fourth in the 3,000-meter steeplechase in 9:30.81 and freshman Matthew Perkins finished sixth in the 1500-meter run in 3:52.58.
Another top finish for the men’s team was senior Stefan Bernardi’s fourth place thrown in the javelin. Bernardi set a season best record at 54.27 meters.
“I still have a lot of work to do,” Bernadi said. “My season goal is to break the school record this year since it is my last year.”
Sophomore John Banovetz scored points in all three of his events and set a personal record in the discus throw at 50.05 meters, provisionally qualifying for the NCAA national meet.
Senior Nate English also provisionally qualified in the shot put with a throw of 16.63 meters and finished fifth at the meet.
The women’s team scored 49.5 points this weekend. Junior Kayla Caldwell finish first in the pole vault for the second week in a row. Teammate senior Chelsea Wackernagel finished just behind Caldwell in third place with a jump of 3.69 meters. Both provisionally qualified for the national meet.
Sophomore Shannon Neby provisionally qualified for the NCAA national meet in the hammer throw at 50.57 meters. Senior Jen Shaffer also provisionally qualified for the national meet in the 800-meter run at 2:11.36.
And the women’s 4×400-meter relay run finished in seventh at 3:55.56.
“It is really exciting to see how everyone is doing,” assistant coach Amanda Mirochna said “They are doing great for where they are and are just about in the right spot for this time in the season.”
Putt went to the Stanford Invite this weekend instead of the meet in Ohio. Towne said that trips to Stanford or Boston are to be looked at as a reward for becoming elite athletes and are a great recruiting tool because it shows future athletes that they have that opportunity at Hillsdale.
“It was a great experience to race at Stanford against some of the nation’s fastest runners,” Putt said. “The race was pretty intense; we were all in a tight pack for most of it, and I ended up near the back for the first half, but I was able to move up pretty well near the end.”
Putt automatically qualified for the national meet in the 1500-meter run at 4:24.84 and broke the school record by about 5 seconds. She also provisionally qualified in the 800-meter run at 2:12.37.
Mirochna said that she did a great job especially for having an injury.
“She went into races very confidently,” Mirochna said. “She didn’t let anything phase her, and at this kind of meet with professional runners, she did great.”
This coming weekend the team will compete at home in the Hillsdale College Invitational. Mirochna said that it would be a great opportunity for them to have a home meet other than the Gina Relays.
Towne said that the opportunity for the invitational came up when they were planning this season’s schedule. He also said that the decision came because Hillsdale has such a great outdoor facility and everyone thought that it would be best to have another meet on it other than the Gina Relays. This will be a smaller meet with high quality teams.
“Everyone is excited to move forward,” Bernadi said. “With all the good people on our team we are able to hold our own, just like all the other teams here at Hillsdale. We are not only going against big Division II schools but also Division I.”