ENGINEERS WIN, FINISHING UNDEFEATED BUT IN SLOPPY FASHION
April 12, 2008
The prospects of a good day weather wise were slim to none and that seemed to pervade the attitude of the MIT Engineers throughout the day. The weather held up, but for the most part the men's team did not. Although the team won the meet ( MIT 224, Bates 171, USM 156, Colby 106) and finished the season undefeated it was one of those victories one just does not feel good about heading into the championship part of the season.
Traveling to Waterville, Maine, a three hour drive, on a cold, supposedly spring day for a meet against host, Colby College, Bates College and the University of Southern Maine, MIT did not start the trip off well, as the number two vaulter, Greg Tao missed the bus. To make matters worse, a major accident on the Maine Turnpike involving a double trailer UPS truck, that closed the Pike, caused the MIT team to get to the meet only 15 minutes prior to the start of the meet. Graciously, Colby moved the MIT field event competitors to the second flight in the throws and horizontal jumps to allow for a better warmup.
The 10K, a non-scoring event in this meet, was first up on the track. Looking for an easy run and to qualify for the New England Division III Championship in three weeks, Brian Jacokes, Joe Roy-Mayhew and Chris Wong went 1-2-3 and easily qualified, running 32:20.00, 32:20.09 and 32:47.50 respectively. The qualifying time was 34:00 and the fact the threesome ran so comfortably bodes well for the weeks to come.
The distance runners got the job done in other events as well. In the 3000 Steeplechase, freshmen, Richard Prevost and Paul Welle, dueled throughout the race all the way to the finish line, both running personal bests of 9:52.70 and 9:52.94 respectively. In the 5000 meter race, the places were not so high but the season improvement was significant as all three MIT runners ran season bests. In a strange race that saw two Bates College runners tear out in a very fast 200 and a quality field including nationally qualified 10K runners, the Wheeler twins from USM holding back, the MIT runners stayed in the middle of the pack running 5:00 mile pace. Gihan Amarasiriwardena tried to stay with the chase group, but got dropped after the 3200 mark. Jack Bourbonnais, running consistent, but conservative pace, passed his teammate, placing fifth with a time of 15:42.11. Trevor Rundell ran a competitive race through 3200 meters then lost focus as he struggled home with a final mile of 5:17.
The pole vaulters had to go inside because of the weather considerations and certainly did not seem to suffer for it. Omari Stephens, running back and forth between the indoor and outdoor track as he negotiated the trials and finals of the hurdles and the start of the men's vault, won easily, vaulting 15-9 for the second week in succession. With Tao not available and presumably asleep back at MIT, Patrick Barragan proved he is in championship form to stay as he vaulted 13-9 1/4 for third place. In addition, Nate Sharpe placed sixth, vaulting 12-9 1/2 and Travis Hery placed seventh with a 12-3 1/2 vault, quite good for the freshman decathlete.
In the throws, James Oleinik had a solid day. He won the shot put with a throw of 48-6 and placed third in the discus with a 133-0 personal best. Tony McDonald had a solid day even though he had no personal bests. Placing fourth in the discus, fifth in the shot and fourth in the hammer provided MIT with some solid points. Also placing for MIT in the shot, Adam Mustafa and Mitchell Kelley placed seventh and eighth respectively with marks of 38-9 1/4 and 37-6. In the hammer, Coco Agbeyibor threw a nice PR of 136-6 to finish sixth. Although he did not place, Mustafa threw a personal best of 126-1.
There were some other good performances but they did not happen with the normal frequency one expects when watching the men's track and field team. Stephen Oney began his season, after missing the last two meets for graduate school interviews, with a 51.76 400, good for second place. In the 800, most of the MIT runners were in the tank on this particular day, but Dave Reshef, running his first 800 this season ran a fine 1:59.85 for eighth place. Omari Stephens competed very well in the 110HH, winning with a season best of 15.28.
Whether the MIT athletes were fatigued, not mentally prepared or some combination of both, they will need to improve if they hope to have a successful championship season.
Next week, MIT hosts their Spring Invitational on Saturday, their last meet before defending their NEWMAC Conference Championship.