| Beach Travel to Tempe This Saturday
49ers Already Have Four NCAA Provisional Marks in the Top-10
49ers Head to Sun Angel Classic: Both the men’s and women’s track and field teams take to the highway when they travel to the Sun Angel Invitational this Saturday in Tempe, AZ. The Beach will send 18 women and 14 men to the event to complete with four Arizona schools, including host Arizona State, LSU, USC, Florida and Colorado State, among others. The team is coming off a sweep of the Big West Challenge last Saturday.
The Coach: Director Andy Sythe is in his 13th season as director of both the track and field and cross country programs. During Sythe’s tenure, 49er track athletes have achieved 73 NCAA qualifying performances, 55 conference champions, had 18 All-Americans, three Big West Athletes of-the-year, one NCAA national champion and another NCAA runner-up.
Big West Challenge Recap: The men’s team took home 10 events in winning the men’s team title with 208 points, while the women’s team took home seven titles, edging UC Irvine 187-to-183. Nine meet records were set at the event, five by The Beach. Glady Iwuaba broke the 18 year old school-record in the triple jump, as well as the meet record with her winning leap of 40’4.75”. Stephanie Sampson won both the discus and hammer events, the latter with a meet record of 166’2.00”. Serena Boykin also put forth a meet record in the shot put (45’8.00”). On the men’s side, Jon O’Neil broke the meet record in the shot and discus. Rashaad Johnsonput forth a strong effort, winning both the 200m (21.38) and 400m (47.68). Jimmy Camilto won the 110m hurdles and then went on to win the pole vault with a height of 16’4.75”.
Amongst the Nation’s Best: According to the latest NCAA rankings of provisional qualifiers, three out of the 49ers five athletes are ranked in the top-10 nationally. Jon O’Neil’s mark (62’6.50”) in the shot put ranks sixth, while his discus mark (190’9.5”) is eighth. Connie Jerz’ pole vault (13’5.25”) and Emily Forsythe’s high jump (5’10.50”) are also both sixth. Cory Loebl’s discus toss (182’4”) and Stephanie Sampson’s hammer throw (187’2”) are both 16th.
Looking Ahead to Conference: Heading into this weekend, 37 men and 37 women have put forth qualifying marks for the Conference Championships. This season four outdoor records have already fallen, in the pole vault, steeplchase, hammer throw and triple jump.
Hitting the Books: Eight women and two men were named to the Indoor Academic All-MPSF team. For The Beach, triple jumper Kenya Jimerson (4.00 grad school), thrower Samy Meredith (3.714) and jumper Connie Jerz (3.575) each have cum GPAs over 3.5.
Traveling the Country: Jon O’Neil (Fountain Valley) and Connie Jerz (Tucson, AZ) racked up the frequent flyer miles to end the indoor season. After competing at the MPSF Championships in Flagstaff, AZ on February 21, the duo traveled to New York City the next week for the USATF Championsips, followed by a trip to the NCAAs, hosted by Arkansas the week after. At the USATFs, O’Neil finished 10th in the shot and 17th in the weight, while Jerz was fifth in the pole vault. Jerz finished 15th at her third NCAA event the following week, while O’Neil was 14th in the shot put at his fourth NCAA Championship.
MPSF Indoor Championship Top-10: Brian Stehmeier (800m, 10th), Daniel Gerlach (long jump, 8th), Jessica Williams (400m, 10th), Holly Lipscomb (long jump, 10th), Gladys Iwuaba (triple jump, 6th) Shannon Daniels (weight, 8th) and Kenya Jimerson (triple jump, 7th) all finished in the top-10 of their respective events at the MPSF Indoor Championsips. The MPSF is one of the nation’s toughest conference’s, featuring the Pac-10, WAC and Big West.
CROSS COUNTRY: Drea Palacio (Fresno), with a 10th place finish (18:49.9) at the Big West Championship 5K on October 27 became the first all-conference runner for The Beach since 1993. The team’s sixth place showing was also the highest since 1993. For the men, they finished eighth with Aaron Durham finishing in 28th place (27:22.4).
NCAA Regional XC: This year the men finished 15th, while the women were 17th. |
