Kats Take To Weekend Action In West Texas
4/10/2014 1:07:00 PM | Track & Field, Women's Track & Field
The Sam Houston State men's and women's track & field programs enter the second half of their outdoor schedule with heptathletes and decathletes in action at the ASU Relays in San Angelo on Thursday and Friday before joining the full squad at the Wes Kittley Invitational in Abilene on Saturday.
“This is their first multi-competition of the outdoor season,” head coach David Self said. “It lets coach (Clint) Blinka and coach (Chris) Jones work with those kids. They put on a great multi-event in San Angelo and it's really designed for them to do well and get marks for the conference meet.”
Amongst the athletes traveling to San Angelo include Jay Roberson, Joey Babbs and Jonathan Andrews for the men and Allyson Pettit, Paula Smith, Frances Porter and Nicole Jenrette for the women.
After the two-day competition in San Angelo, the seven Bearkats will meet their counterparts in Abilene for the one-day Wes Kittley Invitational hosted by Abilene Christian.
“We're going to compete in some relays,” Self said. “We're probably not going to run 4x4's; we're giving that group a light week where we're not going to push a couple races on them. Especially on the straightaway races, hope we get some big wins and run some fast times.”
The field events will kick off Saturday at 11 a.m. with the hammer throw while the track events get underway at 3 p.m. with the 3000 meter steeplechase.
The two west Texas meets will mark the 11th and 12th in 2014 for Sam Houston and with one event still remaining afterwards before the Southland Conference Outdoor Championships, Self looks to keep it a low intensity weekend.
“We're just going to get a race in,” Self said. “We've been going a long time now. The younger kids especially are realizing how long the season truly is. I'm not putting a whole lot of expectations on them right now. We want to do that at the end of the year.”
After battling the trifecta of rain, wind and cold at last weekend's Islanders Dash, Self's only expectation may be one he can't control.
“We're really just looking for warm sunny weather,” Self said. “That would be the greatest thing.”
QUICK HITS
• A total of nine Sam Houston freshmen placed top three at last Saturday's Islanders Dash including a trio of first place finishers (Simon Imagbe, Garrett Larson and Ana Moreno)
• SHSU record-holder Adrienne Quillin ranks first in the Southland Conference in the hammer throw with a distance of 191 ft. 8 inches – 16 ft. 3 inches ahead of the league's second place competitor
• The Bearkat women and men both boast 14 top five positional rankings in the Southland Conference – second and third in the league respectively
• Senior Charles White's first place finish at the Islanders Dash was the 16th of his SHSU career with eight coming in the triple jump and eight in the long jump
• The SHSU heptathletes and decathletes – who will compete in both San Angelo and Abilene – will travel over 750 miles round-trip this weekend – all without leaving the confines of the state of Texas
QUOTES
Head coach David Self on the difficulty of battling the elements last weekend:
“To have it be windy, cold and rainy, that's the trifecta for track and field athletes. You go in to compete and get some good stuff going but you know you're not going to get great performances; especially in the sprints. You don't want to be out in it warming up. This time of the year, the weather is so indicative of how our performances are going to be. If you don't get a good day, you're just not going to get good performances. In track, we're so involved in numbers some times that all the kids see sometimes is that 'I didn't run fast.'”
On the back end of the schedule:
“We knew the Islanders Dash at Corpus would be kind of a low key affair so we kind of used it as a training meet where we ran a lot of races. We're going to go down, get a meet in under our belt (this weekend) and come back next week and start our focus on tapering down and getting ready for the conference meet.”
