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The Dartmouth
July 17, 2025 | Latest Issue
The Dartmouth

Track makes early-season strides at Invitational

Both the men's and women's indoor track teams kicked off their seasons on the right foot this weekend at the Dartmouth Invitational held in Leverone Fieldhouse. The Dartmouth Invitational is a three-day meet that features high school athletes and older athletes who compete unattached, in addition to college athletes. The Dartmouth Invitational, one of the biggest meets in New England, is a major early-season meet. Because it was an early-season meet, times did not figure as crucially this weekend as they will at later meets.

The Dartmouth women finished in first place with 163 points, blowing out their nearest competitor, UMass-Lowell, who finished with 66 points. On the men's side, Big Ten power Illinois took the event with 154 points, with the Big Green coming in second with 91 points. Final results were not available at the time of publication.

For the men's squad, Tim Wunderlich '09 turned in a breakout performance, breaking 5,000 points for the first time in the heptathlon and placing second in the event with a score of 5,012 points. This performance moved him up to number three on Dartmouth's all-time list. Tyler Koskenoja '07 was third in the event, putting up 4956 points. There were some strong performances in the shorter events, with Brian Evans '08 turning in a stellar performance in the 60-meter dash. Peter Piderman '10 was also impressive in the 60-meter hurdles, and both Evans and Piderman made the finals in their respective events. The results of the finals were not yet available at the time of publication.

For the women, there were many impressive performances in the field. Natalie Todd-Zebell '09 was first in the pole vault, clearing 12-00. Jadah Chatterton-Richmond '07 finished third in the pentathalon and Jamila Smith '06 was third in the weight throw with a throw of 52-04.75. On the track, Ali Smrcina '10 was third in the women's mile with a time of 5:15.90.

Several meet records were broken in the meet. In the men's 60-meter hurdles, Bryan Pratt from Illinois set a meet record with a time of 8.16, breaking the previous record by three-tenths of a second. Esther Akinsulie of the Ottawa Lions set a new meet record of 8.63 in the 60-meter hurdles and Emanuel Parris of the University of Sherbrooke set a new meet record in the 60-meter dash, breaking his own record with a time of 6.78. Andrea Allen, running unattached, broke the record in the 400-meter with a time of 55.41.

The meet also saw a world record on Saturday, as Flo Meiler cleared 6-11 in the pole vault setting a master's world record for women aged 70-74.

Since this is the beginning of the season, the focus of this meet was not posting impressive times. Still, the meet provided exposure important for recruiting and allowed younger runners to quell preseason jitters. The runners only started formal practice on Tuesday, and many of Dartmouth's runners did not compete, opting to train through the meet.

Women's track coach Sandy Ford-Centonze was pleased that her team was able to start the season in a relaxed setting.

"The most important thing in this meet is that we get the season started on the right foot. That means having everyone healthy and we get the runners training properly, because not everyone has the right equipment training at home. It's also a good meet because the runners enjoy competing in this meet. The pressure is off now going into some of the smaller meets, so now we can focus on peaking at the right time, for the Heptagonal meet at the end of February," said Ford-Centonze.

Men's track and field head coach Barry Harwick was also pleased with his team's progress early in the season, noting that it was important in getting the season started well and making sure that the athletes pace themselves so that they peak at the right time.

"The Dartmouth Relays is a good way for our program to gain exposure in the track and field community and it helps out a lot in terms of recruiting. It's also exciting to have a very strong team like Illinois come to this meet, since they are a very good team and it adds excitement to the meet," Harwick said.

The Big Green will be back in action next Saturday as both the men's and women's teams will take on New Hampshire and Vermont at Leverone Fieldhouse, where the teams will be looking to pick up their first duel meet wins of the season.