Saturday Dartmouth's men's and women's track teams ran at Memorial Field for the first time this outdoor season. Both teams finished victoriously, with the men's team easily outdistancing the University of Vermont by 43 points and the women's team defeating both Vermont and the University of New Hampshire.
With the outcome of both meets pretty much determined from the beginning, the drama of the day focused around the women's 3,000 meters where four of Dartmouth's best distance runners, Juniors Maribel Sanchez and Kristin Manwaring, Senior Kristin Cobb, and Freshman Jenna Rogers competed against each other and the clock.
The four ran together over the first mile before spreading out over the last four laps. "Our coach wanted all four of us to run around 9:40," Sanchez said. Kristin was supposed to lead us through the first mile in 5:08."
After the mile point in the race, Sanchez said they "tried to keep it [the fast pace] rolling. We didn't have any competition so we had to run off each other."
Sanchez, an indoor All-American, won in time of 9:31. Manwaring, coming off last week's winning performances in both the 800 and the 1,500 meters, ran strongly into second, finishing in 9:35. Rogers and Cobb finished third and fourth respectively.
Sanchez, Manwaring and Rogers all ran personal bests despite the raw conditions. Sanchez dropped eight seconds from her personal best winning in 9:31. Manwaring knocked off 27 seconds from her previous best time. Both Manwaring and Sanchez's performances were provisional NCAA qualifying times.
Also on the track, Kristin Pierce '96 doubled up, winning the 800 and 1,500 meters. In the 800, Pierce pulled past a Vermont runner over the last 100 meters and cruised to victory. Teammate Emily Hodgson '98 also used the final 20 meters to take second place.
Pierce was happy with her races as she had not competed in these events for 2 years.
She said she competed in them this weekend to "mix things up" and "get some speed training." Pierce usually competes in the 3,000 and 5,000 meter events. Her winning times were 2:24 and 4:43.
The men's 43 point victory came from a balanced team performance as Dartmouth won 11 of the 19 events and failed to take first or second in only two events, one of which Dartmouth chose not to contest.
A number of long distance runners took the weekend off after what co-Captain Ted FitzPatrick '95 said was an intense week of practice in preparation for the upcoming Penn Relays at the end of the month.
Coach Barry Harwick said he was not surprised by the meet's result, even without a number of his top distance runners competing. The meet was important for a number of field event athletes who were competing for only the second time this season.
The weight events proved predictably valuable, as Dartmouth, led by Alex Ghanotakis '97, who won both the hammer and discus, took the first two places in the hammer, discus and shot put.
Ghanotakis won the hammer with a toss of 165' even and discus with a throw of 159'10". Adam Nelson '97 won the shot put with a throw of 57 feet and finished second in the discus.
