Bulls track and field has had a strong indoor season so far, and that momentum carried into this past weekend at the David Hemery Valentine Invite at Boston University. Going into this meet, the Bulls had already added 32 new runs, throws and jumps to the UB record books, and after the weekend they have come away with 10 more. With top schools from the northeast, like Princeton and Harvard in attendance, the Bulls had their work cut out for them in this two-day meet.
The meet began on Friday, Feb. 13th, with the men's events. The Bulls would see their first podium finish from senior hurdler, Michael Parks. Parks placed second in the finals of the 60-meter hurdles with a time of 7.98 seconds, winning his preliminary heat with a time of 8.02 seconds. Later in the day, freshman runners Keoni Chong and Kala’i Makanani would place sixth and 14th respectively, in the 400-meter event that had over 100 competitors. This performance would secure Makanani a T-10th spot on the school’s indoor track “All-Time Top Ten” with a time of 48.88. Chong, with a time of 48.46, now ranks sixth in the event in the All-Time rankings at UB.
Some of the biggest performances of the day came in the men’s one1-mile race. Senior distance runner Noah Brightman broke the school’s mile record, posting a time of 4:03.62 and placing 51st overall. In the same event, sophomore distance runner Aidan Norris, would run the fourth fastest time in UB history, crossing the line at 4:07.38 and placing 101st.
The men also added two new times into the “All-Time Top Ten” in the 5000-meter event. Senior distance runner Jacob Brink would post the seventh fastest time in UB indoor history, and junior distance runner Cameron Bogdan would secure the second fastest time; they would cross the line with times of 14:27.12 and 14:14.32 respectively.
Moving onto the women’s competition on Saturday, four performances would enter the “All-Time Top Ten” record book. The most notable of these runs came from senior distance runner Vassi Klock, who broke the school record in the mile with a time of 4:46.99. Klock would place 24th in the mile among a field of over 200 competitors. If the new record was not enough for the Bulls in the mile, senior distance runner Bronagh Cassidy, would run the seventh fastest time in UB history at 4:56.18.
In addition to the record times posted in the mile, graduate student runner Allison Newton and sophomore sprinter Sophia Sampson, both ran the eighth fastest times in UB indoor history for in the 400-meter and 800-meter events, respectively. This meet would also see a personal best and tenth place finish from junior runner Uma Bhattacharjee in the 200-meter dash with a time of 25.11 seconds.
The Bulls will have one more meet on Feb. 21st at Cornell University in Ithaca NY. This will be the team’s last chance to compete before the Mid-American Conference (MAC) Indoor Championships the following weekend.
Ciah Courtney is the senior sports editor and can be reached at ciah.courtney@ubspectrum.com
Photo: Courtesy of Sevda Abdavinejad
