ABILENE – Abilene Christian's nationally ranked men's and women's track and field teams head north to Lubbock for the sixth and final time this season Thursday when they take part in the
Red Raider Open.
The single-day midweek meet will serve as the Wildcats' final tune up for the
Lone Star Championships set for May 2-4 in Canyon, Texas on the campus of West Texas A&M.
Field events are scheduled to begin at 10:30 a.m. at the Texas Tech Throws Area with running events beginning on the Terry and Linda Fuller Track at 6 p.m.
ACU's competition includes several LSC programs, including Angelo State, Eastern New Mexico and West Texas A&M, plus North Texas and the host Red Raiders.
The Wildcats enter this week's meet with 18 individual performances and one relay appearing in the top-40 of the NCAA Division-II Outdoor Qualifying list. This group is led by seniors Amanda Ouedraogo and Baptiste Kerjean, each of who recorded a new school record during last weekend's trip to the Mt. SAC Relays.
Ouedraogo finished sixth in the triple jump elite field with a career-best effort of 43-feet, 6 inches (13.26 meters), which she recorded on her final attempt. The native of Hauts de Seine, France opened with a distance of 42-2 (12.85m) and then fouled three-straight times before surpassing Stephanie Warren's former school record of 43-04.25 (13.21m).
Ouedraogo has twice competed in the triple jump this spring and each time has recorded a NCAA automatic qualifying mark; however, she still ranks second in D-II to Angelo State's Kearah Danville (43-7/13.28m).
Kerjean broke his own school record in the hammer throw with an eighth-place distance of 218-00 (66.44m) that currently ranks him second in D-II to Ashland's Garrett Grey (218-10/66.71m).
On the Mt. SAC track, senior Ayesha Rumble ran a season best and barely missed her personal record with an 800-meter time of 2:11.08 that moved her up to 13th in the nation. Chloe Susset recorded a season best in the steeplechase with a mark of 10:39.43 that ranks seventh among all D-II competitors, and freshman Xavier King set a PR in the 1500m of 3:54.43, which is still about 2.5 seconds off the provisional time.
ACU also sent a large number of student-athletes to Baylor's Michael Johnson/Dr. Pepper Classic where junior Andrew Hudson had a solid season best showing of 177-6 in the discus, which was just a few inches below the automatic mark and moved him up to No. 5 nationally.
Freshman Jelani Rainey continued to show steady improvement in the hammer with his PR throw of 161-8, while senior Tara Riley recorded a career best distance in the javelin of 126-1. Riley is already one of the top discus thrower/shot putters in the conference and appears determined to be competitive in a third event as she is now within five feet of the provisional mark in the javelin.
Senior James Grantham was one of several runners-up for ACU on the Hart-Patterson Track, and produced a tremendous effort in recording a career best time of 3:56.10 in the 1500m. Grantham took the lead in the race on the second lap and held it for more than 400 meters; and even when the eventual winner (Clint Anders of Sam Houston State) passed him, Grantham held on and tried to mount another comeback about 100 meters out.
Additional second-place finishes at Baylor were recorded by freshman Johnathan Farquharson in the 100 (10.67) and Jeremy Tatham in the 110 hurdles (15.40).
ACU's men's 4x100 team of Osei Allyene-Forte, Devan Brown, Farquharson and Jordan Geary just missed tying its season best provisional mark of 40.78 by .01 seconds.
