Big Relays and Black to #5 in US at Open NE

(2/25/2013 8:47 AM) Full Results

The PRs and season bests continued to drop this weekend at the two-day NEICAAA Championships hosted by Boston University. New England is unique as the only region in the country to host a championship meet in all three seasons with schools from all divisions. The Jumbos made sure to take full advantage of the quality competition.

In the 200m, junior Graham Beutler inched closer to his PR with a season best of 22.40. Rookie Alex Kasimer added a new best time of his in the 500m at 1:07.14, earning him spot of the Freshman Top 10 list.

In the 800m, freshman Mitchell Black and senior captain Jeff Marvel both improved on their marks this season. Marvel got down to 1:53.14 but unfortunately was the first athlete to miss the final, while Black dropped almost two seconds to 1:51.89 to shatter his own freshman record, move to number two all-time, and secure the fifth-fastest time in the nation. He fought tough for fourth on Saturday in 1:52.77.

Senior Adam Brosh kept the mid-d momentum building as he put up a huge lifetime best of 2:30.85 in the 1000m, moving up way up the All Time list. His even-split PR bodes well should he be tapped for a DMR leg and shows he has the strength/speed combination for a big improvement in the 1500m outdoors. Sophomore Alex Sheltzer also took a step in the right direction with a PR of 2:34.71.

Friday night also saw the Jumbos put together a “B” DMR that ran a respectable 10:29.05, highlighted by a 3:11 opener by freshman 600/800 runner Veer Bhalla and a solid 4:26 anchor by sophomore Alex Schifter, his best mile run in college.

Saturday kicked off with Jamie Norton in the mile as he looked to improve on his 4:10 from January. Unfortunately a 65 opening quarter made that goal exponentially harder to achieve. Still, Norton closed in 2:00 for the final half mile to finish 14th in 4:11.13.

In the 3000m, junior Liam Cassidy put together one of the best races of his career as he builds back this winter with a 15th-place finish in 8:38.73, his second time under 8:40 and bested only by his freshman record of 8:34.

Senior Gbola Ajayi continued to look for that breakout triple jump performance and improved on his best this year to 14.39m. His two best jumps, however, were millimeters over the board and would have had him out over 14.50m. He’ll have to look to next week to punch his ticket to NCAAs.

In the throwing sector, Curtis Yancy added some consistency to his indoor campaign with another throw over 18 meters, this one to 59-07.75 and good enough for fourth place.

To cap things off, the Jumbos put up one more season best and a top-10 all-time performance in the 4x400m and 4x800m relays. The quartet of Kasimer, Beutler, Vinnie Lee, and Lawrence Xia got down to 3:21.10, thanks to a 48.6 carry for Beutler and a huge 51.6 for Xia, who only recently returned to working out and ran a 55 last weekend. That kicked off a 7:48.36 two-mile relay—second-fastest in school history—as Schifter, Bhalla, and Brosh all doubled back and joined first-year Alex Apostolides.

One weekend remains before the National Championships. The Jumbos will play host once more for the Tufts Last Chance Meet. Look for a few more nationally qualifying marks, particularly out of the stacked DMR and 5k fields.


Full Results