On Friday February 18th and Saturday February 19th the Hillsdale Women’s track team won the Hillsdale Tune-Up meet. The team had two members break the weight throwing record from 2017 and won eight events.
Hillsdale came out on top against the five other teams competing, finishing with 138 points, 72 points in front of Adrian in second place. The Chargers scored more points than the second, third, and fourth place teams combined.
Sayles and junior Nikita Maines both broke Hillsdale’s record for weight throw from 2017 of 19.08 meters set by Dana Newell ‘19.
Sayles finished in first place with a distance of 20.07 meters, going far past the record and setting a new personal best.
Sayles said she was grateful to compete and have another chance to do great.
“After breaking my record, I felt really good, all of my hard work has paid off,” Sayles said. “ I was also beyond grateful to my coach for helping me to get better.”
Sayles said her biggest strategies are having confidence in herself and having fun during meets.
“I feel prepared for the championship season,” Sayles said. “I’ve been dedicated and hardworking throughout the season and I trust in my coaches’ training to put me in the best position as possible to throw far during championships.”
Maines finished in second place in weight throw by throwing a distance of 19.64 meters and moved up to the seventh best mark in the NCAA Division II.
Freshmen Chargers also swept the G-MAC women’s Athlete of the Week Awards. Reese Dragovich won the track athlete award while Sayles won the field athlete award.
The team started out strong as junior Zalonya Eby took first in the 60 meter dash with a time of 7.93. Eby was followed closely by freshman Shura Ermakov with a time of 8.03.
The Chargers continued to dominate as Isabella Guittierrez took first in the 200 meter dash with a time of 25.97.
In the 800 meter run Dragovich took first with a time of 2:16.05. Following closely behind, freshman Nicole Marshall took second with a time of 2:18.86.
In the 3000 meter run freshman Brynn Edison took third with a time of 11:18.39 minutes. Edison said she felt the race went well and that this event was a shorter distance compared to what she’s used to. However she said that racing the 3000 meters was a good experience for the future.
“It was a bit like going in blind,” Edison said. “It had been four years since I raced a 2 mile and a 3k is 200 meters less than that. I was confident in my abilities but also a bit apprehensive about pacing.”
Edison also said that the competition was good but that it can sometimes be hard to track where runners are in their individual places on the indoor track. However, Edison did not let this stop her from earning a top spot.
“I just treated everyone in front of me as competition and went from there,” Edison said.
In the 60 meter run freshmen Louisa Klasearner and Grace Gottwalt took first and second with times of 9.08 and 9.36 seconds.
In the high jump freshman Reagan Dahlquist took first, reaching a height of 1.67 meters. Dahlquist was followed by junior Alexie Day reaching a height of 1.63 meters.
In the pole vaulting event freshmen Morgan Iverson and Katie Clifford took second and third vaulting heights of 3.66 and 3.51 meters. Iverson and Clifford were followed by freshmen Isabella Socha in fourth with a height of 3.36 meters and Kaylee Jackson in fifth with a height of 3.21 meters.
In the triple jump sophomore Emily Gerdin took first, jumping a distance of 11.11 meters. Gerdin was followed by freshman Grace Chen with a distance of 10.10 meters.
In the shot put event, Maines took first throwing a distance of 15.10 meters. Maines was followed by freshman Averi Parker who took second and threw a distance of 14.17 meters.
Freshmen Peyton Panka and Sayles took fourth and fifth with distances of 12.63 and 12.09 meters.
The G-MAC Indoor Championships start on Friday, Feb. 25 in Findlay Ohio and finish on Saturday.
