<s another week of split squads for the Knights, but they pulled out some great performances anyway. Part of the team went down to Iowa to race at the Drake Relays while the rest went to Gustavus Adolphus to compete in the Drake Alternative.
The racing kicked off on Thursday with Simone Childs-Walker ’12, Alison Smyth ’12, and Taylor Ffitch ’12 running the 10k to the beat of a marching band. Childs-Walker led the way, placing fifth in the highly competitive field in 35:40, which ranks her fourth in the country in division III at this time. Next was Smyth finishing twelfth, followed by Ffitch, running the race for the first time in two seasons.
Much to the surprise of their fellow competitors, the Knights went to class on Friday and then continued competing on Saturday. The 4 x 800 entry of Clare Franco ’12, Haley Johnson ’13, Sarah Trautman ’13, and Kaitlin Randolph ’12 placed ninth in a talented field, edging the tenth place finishers by five one-hundredths of a second.
Ninth is nice, but winning is nicer. That’s what Ellie Wilson ’15 did in the 400m and Megan Erlandson ’12 did in the 800m. Erlandson beat her nearest competitor by five seconds and also recorded a season’s best height in the pole vault.
The weather at Carleton (which most students probably remember from watching frisbee games) was not ideal for throwing heavy implements. However, that didn’t stop Avery Johnson ’15 from finishing fourth in the javelin throw.
The weather was much better for longer events, proven by a number of mid- and long-distance runners. Becca Herd finished fifth in the 1500m in her debut at the distance, running 5:02. Her teammates Lindsay Turchan ’15 and Claire Karban ’13 also ran best times at that distance, finishing in the top ten.
Another outstanding performance was had by Shannon Mueller ’12, running the 5k ten seconds faster than she did last week to record a 19:01 and place seventh in the event.
Things are looking good for the Knights. They competed at the Tommie Twilight meet on Wednesday, trying to secure bids to next week’s conference championships. We’ll have to wait and see who gets in, but it will probably be a large percentage of the team.