Juhan: Cornell University Athletics - Men's Track Impesses in Outdoor ...

Complete Results

SAN DIEGO, Calif. ? The Big Red men's and women's track and field teams had a strong start to the outdoor season, more than holding their own against excellent competition at the Aztec Invitational over the weekend by combining for 28 ECAC/IC4A qualifying performances and three event wins.
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Competing in San Diego for the first time against a field that had Olympians and NCAA champions while also having to deal with lengthy travel, Cornell still produced five changes to the all-time top-10 lists in school history.
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The Cornell men had a strong start to the trip, with two event wins, 12 IC4A qualifiers and 20 top-10 finishes. The Big Red was particularly impressive in the field events.
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Junior All-American Montez Blair was the top Cornell long jumper with a fourth-place leap of 22' 4 1/4? and then came back to win the high jump with a clearance of 7' 2 1/2?. Classmate Tommy Butler came through with an outdoor personal record to place third in 7' 1/2?, No. 4 all-time at Cornell.
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Cornell's shot put All-American, sophomore Stephen Mozia, had an outstanding weekend. After placing 10th in the hammer on Friday (162' 4?), he set an outdoor personal record in the shot put with a heave of 62' 1/2? to place second, behind only last week's NCAA Indoor runner-up and No. 2 all-time at Cornell outdoors. He also qualified for IC4As with a mark of 158' 2? in the discus, where he placed 13th.
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Also in the throws, sophomore Robert Robbins had an auspicious debut for Cornell, throwing 219' 5? in the javelin to place second and debut at No. 3 on the Cornell all-time list. Also placing in the top 10 in the throws was freshman Bryan Rhodes, who threw 166' 6? in the hammer for ninth.
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In the pole vault, sophomore Steven Pawlak bettered the IC4A standard with a clearance of 15' 9 3/4? for sixth, and classmate Keith Rayburn finished in the top 10 with a ninth-place clearance of 15' 8 1/4?.
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In the horizontal jumps, junior Steven Bell (eighth, 21' 4 3/4? in the long jump and fourth, 44' 9? in the triple jump) and junior Hercules Stancil (ninth, 21' 4 3/4? in the long jump) placed in the top 10.
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Even as the Big Red was excelling in the field, there were several outstanding efforts on the track. Senior co-captain Jedidiah Adarquah-Yiadom won the 100 against a stellar field, crossing the line in 10.83 despite running into a head-wind, an IC4A qualifier in his first outdoor race of the year.
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The Big Red middle distance corps was impressive in the 800: junior Will Weinlandt was the top collegiate finisher, placing second overall in 1:51.41 (an IC4A qualifier), senior Will McFall ran 1:53.64 for seventh and sophomore Rutger Admirand placed ninth in 1:53.90. There was a pair of top five finishes in the 400 hurdles: Junior Andre Anderson was second overall in an IC4A qualifying 52.83, and freshman Max Hairston was fifth in 53.97.
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Earlier, Hairston was third in the 110 hurdles in 14.59 and was joined as an IC4A qualifier by Zach Zeller, who ran 14.71 for sixth.
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Also placing in the top 10 as an individual on the track was freshman Larry Gibson, who was ninth in the 400 at 48.99. In the meet's final event, the 4x400 placed third with an IC4A qualifying time as the quartet of junior Kinsley Ojukwu (49.7), Admirand (49.0), Anderson (49.3) and Gibson (47.8) ran 3:15.94.
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The team now heads up to Irvine for a week of training on their facility and will conclude the trip with the UC Irvine Spring Break Invitational on Friday and Saturday.