The Hillsdale College men’s track and field team hosted two meets last weekend, winning the Wide Track Invite on Friday, and taking third at the Wide Track Classic on Saturday against a nearly doubled field of teams.
The Chargers scored 96 points on Friday, beating out five other teams. The only team within 60 points of their score was Sienna Heights with 88. On Saturday, four other teams were added to the mix, including Cornerstone and Bethel, who took first and second respectively with 79 and 61.5 points. Hillsdale took third with 47 points.
“We really focus on the month of January as a way to prepare ourselves for championship season, which we’re easing up on right now,” Head Coach Andrew Towne said. “Our focal point is making sure that we’re preparing and executing the way we want to even though in terms of our physical readiness, it surely won’t be where it is during championship season.”
On Friday, Hillsdale won five of the nine track events, including sophomore Benu Meintjes and freshman Jamahl Burke taking first and second in the 400 meter dash.
Five Chargers finished in the top six places in the mile run, led by senior Mark Miller, who beat out Academy of Art sophomore Hudson Lockette by 0.03 seconds for a dramatic win.
Freshman Sean Fagan won the 60 meter hurdles while sophomore Sean Hoeft won the 800 meter run, each posting personal best in their events. Hoeft also joined senior Jack Shelley and freshmen Ross Kuhm and Preston Fagerlin to win the 4×400 meter relay.
Junior Ben Raffin won pole vault for the Chargers, as he continues to perform well after a slow start to the season.
“Ben’s a multiple time all-American for us,” Towne said. “The year hadn’t started out exactly the way he wanted, but he’s starting to show some really good progress now, so I was really happy with him.”
Towne said the team intentionally scheduled meets for two days in a row to better prepare them for later in the season.
“When you get to the championship meets, they’re two-day meets, and so what we like to do is about a month out, try to replicate that, certainly we prepare for that in our training, but doing it in a competitive setting,” Towne said. “We want to get to the championship meets and be familiar with what that feels like, to bounce back on a second day and have to execute again, maybe you feel good, maybe you don’t, but the task is still at hand.”
On Saturday, Hillsdale again won the 4×400, as Meintjes and Burke joined freshman Maliq Brock and junior Ian Calvert.
After taking second in long jump on Friday, sophomore Josh Nichols grabbed a win in triple jump with a new personal best while Raffin notched a season best in pole vault to take second place.
“I felt pretty good on Saturday,” Nichols said. “I wasn’t super happy with my jump because it’s a college PR and not a lifetime PR, but I’m glad I’m at least moving in the right direction.”
On Saturday, the team will be traveling to the Jud Logan Invite in Ashland.
“Splitting up the team is something we looked at doing at the beginning of the year, in a normal year, we probably would, with COVID everybody’s a little different so everybody’s going to be at Ashland.” Towne said.