By Carter Melrose
The Hawkeye track and field team participated in a plethora of events this past week and weekend. Some of the team went down to Florida to compete in the Florida Relays, while others traveled to California to either race in the San Francisco State Distance Carnival or the Stanford Invitational.
The San Francisco State meet came with many noteworthy performances.In the 200 meters, freshman Emmanuel Ogwo finished 10th in a men’s field of sponsored racers, and junior Sheridan Champe placed 12th in the women’s 400-meter hurdles. Another top-10 finish came from Chris Douglas in the men’s 400-meter hurdles.
Then sophomore Mar’yea Harris put on the best performance of the weekend in the men’s 400 meters in the Florida Relays. He not only set a personal best, he also was able to place third in a stacked field and put his name on the leaderboards for being top 10 this season in the country for the 400 with a time of 45.73.
“They actually didn’t get to the hotel until 2 a.m. because of a delayed flight, so not a lot of those guys had a lot of rest,” Director of Track and Field Joey Woody said in a release. “To see Mar’yea come out and run 45.7 and [personal record] in the wind was great. He didn’t let that affect him and probably could have run a lot faster.”
In the same race, freshman Collin Hofacker was able to follow close behind Harris with a sixth-place finish and a showing that points to a bright future for the first-year racer. This performance by the duo also displays the talent that Woody is developing with the Hawkeye middle-distance athletes.
These performances were followed by another depiction of the Hawkeye’s middle-distance prowess in the 4×400-meter relay. The Hawkeyes mustered a third-place finish as well as praise from Woody.
“We had really good performances today and finished it off with a great 4×400-meter race,” he said in a release.
In terms of relays, the real fun happened at an earlier time during the Florida Relays in the form of a broken school record. In the 4×200-meter relay with junior O’Shea Wilson, senior Brendan Thompson, Hofacker, and senior Jared Ganschow, the Hawkeyes came in eighth. A seemingly low finish was saved by the team being able to break the school record and surprise Woody in the process.
“This was a good relay for us. It was fun to have Brendan and Jared on there with O’Shea,” Woody said in a release. “It was also a good way for Collin to open things up to get ready for the 4×4. We weren’t expecting to run a school-record, but we felt good about our team and ran well.”
Hawkeye throwers Avery Meyers and Reno Tuufuli were back at it again with tag-team-like strong performances in the discus. Tuufuli finished second in the discus, staying hot after his Big Ten Field Athlete of the Week honor a week ago. Meyers, in a separate discus competition, finished first and notched a top-10 Hawkeye throw.