Big Green men's and women's track and field showed poise and form this weekend with the women placing first in their home tri-meet on Saturday while the men racked up a second-place finish at their quad-meet at Northeastern Friday night.
The Dartmouth men's team beat Northeastern University and Rutgers University on the way to a second-place finish with 79.5 points. The University of Connecticut snagged first place with 97 points. But the men's team was able to grab more IC4A qualfiers.
"U. Conn is probably the most powerful team in New England," co-Captain Eric Szegda '97 said. "It was good to see how we matched up against them."
Team co-captain Jim Tuxbury '97 placed first in the one-mile run with a time of 4:07:01 -- a personal best and the fifth-fastest time in Dartmouth history. This run gave Tuxbury his second IC4A qualifier. At his last race, Tuxbury qualified in the 1000 meter.
Steve Clark '97 also qualified for the IC4A after a second-place finish in the high jump.
"Steve Clark was trying to break the school record and clear seven feet on his last jump but he didn't do it," Szegda said. "He cleared six feet and ten inches but he's there and it's just a matter of time ... just waiting for the right day."
During last week's meet six team members -- Don Conrad '99, Alex Ghanotakis '97, Reynaldo Hubbard '99, Greg Johnston '99, Chris Langan '97 and Tuxbury -- qualified for the IC4A.
Johnston placed second in the 55 meter hurdles with a time of 7.42 seconds -- his time was three seconds off qualifying for NCAA Championships.
At home in Leverone Field House, the women's team continued to prove their stuff but only narrowly beat the University of Vermont and the University of New Hampshire.
It was an amazing final run by the 4x8 team that nudged Dartmouth ahead of UVM by four points for the final victory.
"That was the race that it came down to," Co-Captain Pilar Rodriguez said. "If we lost that race, the score would've been flipped around and we would have been the ones losing by four points."
