ABILENE – Abilene Christian's nationally ranked men's and women's track and field teams will once again visit the Texas Panhandle this weekend for the second-annual West Texas A&M Open and Multi.
The two-day event will take place at the West Texas A&M University Track, which also will serve as host for the upcoming
Lone Star Conference Championships the weekend of May 2.
ACU last week competed at the Texas Tech Open and came away with a number of highlights and personal best performances. Notable among them was senior Chloe Susset's victory in the 3,000-meter steeplechase. Susset won the race with a time of 10:56.98, which ranks her seventh among all NCAA Division-II competitors.
Also winning for the Wildcats in Lubbock were hammer throwers Shalania Lakey and Baptiste Kerjean. Lakey and teammate Lauren Hardwick finished first and second in this event with distances of 164 feet - 5 inches (50.11 meters) and 154-6 (47.10m), respectively, while Kerjean won for the second time in three tries behind a top effort of 198-0 (60.35m).
Junior Andrew Hudson and freshman Jelani Rainey also registered personal records in the hammer, as did senior Tara Riley in the javelin (123-8/37.69m). Hudson finished third in the hammer with a distance of 169-0 (51.51m), while Rainey came in fifth (159-1/48.48m).
Senior multi-athlete Matthew Stark, meanwhile, produced PRs in the pole vault (15-1.25) and 110-meter hurdles (16.00) and is expected to compete in this weekend's decathlon alongside freshman Luke Woods. Woods last weekend also improved on his 110 hurdles time with a mark of 15.74 seconds.
Woods scored 6,112 points in his collegiate decathlon debut at the Bobcat Invitational the weekend of March 28 and 29, finishing just 88 points short of reaching the provisional mark in this event.
Highlights from the Terry and Linda Fuller Track, included freshman Johnathan Farquharson posting a provisional mark in the 200-meter dash of 21.23 seconds and senior Ayesha Rumble improving on her ranking in the 800m (2:11.22). Rumble's time was just shy of her personal best, but is still the fifth fastest in D-II this season.
Freshman Devan Brown also recorded personal bests in the 100 (10.87) and 200 (21.76).
Events this weekend begin at 2 p.m. Friday with the decathlon 100-meter dash and conclude Saturday night with the men's 4x400-meter relay.
