CALDEWELL, ID -- The Warner Pacific University track and field team kicked off the indoor track season with a great series of marks at the Icebreaker Meet hosted by College of Idaho. "We weren't sure we would even get a chance to compete in indoor track this year, so it is especially rewarding to get so many good marks out of this first meet. We not only got the rust off, but we broke some school records and got some national qualifiers as well" said head coach
Randy Dalzell.
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The Rundown
In all, the Knights won two events, broke two school records, and put three athletes in contention for the NAIA Indoor National Championships. Brittany Coleman won the women's triple jump with a new indoor personal best of 38' 1.5". That mark will certainly qualify her for the NAIA Indoor National meet in March as it makes her ranked #4 in the nation in the women's triple jump. Jett Pharn-Cromb was second in the men's 60m dash and second in the men's 200m dash. He set a new school record of 6.88 seconds in the 60m dash and that mark moves him up to #12 on the current national list. The top 16 athletes on that national list will get to go to nationals, so he is in strong contention to compete at nationals. His 200m time of 22.07 was the second fastest indoor 200m time in WPU history.
"I was just happy to get a chance to compete after such a long break. It wasn't really on my mind to break the school record. I just wanted to run fast enough to get to nationals and it looks like I should have a good shot at that. The overall experience of bonding with teammates and finally getting to travel and compete with them was great!" said Pharn-Cromb.
Deeper Look
Indya Price finished second and broke the school record in the women's 1000m with a time of 3:07.22, finishing close behind EOU's All-American in that same event last year. That time ranks her about 20
th in the nation and shows that she has a good chance to go to nationals with a couple more competitions to slightly improve that time. Kynzie DeLeon won the women's 3000m, even though the conditions were very difficult with winds and running by herself for a good portion of the race. She will have a couple of more chances to run in better conditions and try to get a national qualifying time. Savannah Proske finished third in the women's pentathlon with the second best mark in WPU history – 2822 points. That mark ranks her about 22
nd in the nation. She too, will have at least one more chance to try to get a better mark.
Flash Forward:
The Knights will host a small and very limited event indoor meet next Saturday at Portland Christian High School, then head back to Idaho the week after that for the last indoor qualifier right back at College of Idaho in February 19 and 20. Then they will see who gets to go to the NAIA Indoor National Championships in South Dakota the first week of March.