The Red Raider track team traveled to Brookings, South Dakota, last weekend and competed in the SDSU Indoor Classic. It was a tough meet with many good teams competing. Overall, the men placed 16th out of 25 teams and the women placed 14th out of 21.
Three male Raiders met the auto mark and one met the provisional mark. The men’s distance medley ran extremely well, placing second out of eight and was only a mere second behind Drake. They finished with a time of 10:04.7 which met the auto mark and is currently the fastest time in the NAIA. That medley consists of seniors Aaron Lemon, Hans Epp, Tim Rose and junior Peter Hollinger.
Lemon met another auto mark in the 600m. He placed sixth out of 54 athletes with a time of 1:20.69. Along with Lemon, Hollinger met the auto mark in his respective event, the 800m. He placed 14th out of 110 athletes in that event with a time of 1:54.2.
Senior Cody Bauman met the NAIA provisional mark in the shot put as he finished 20th out of 53 with a throw of 50-06. Overall the Raiders posted 10 top 25 finishes at one of the largest and toughest meets this season.
The Raider women also had a good day at a hard-hitting meet. The distance medley team had a phenomenal race as they won the event by almost six seconds over the next fastest team. They ran the event in a time of 11:57.1, which is a school record. That team consists of seniors Katie Bosch, Katie Landhuis, junior Rebekah Muilenburg and sophomore Bre Harthoorn. The race met the auto mark and is currently the fastest time in the NAIA. The same group of four holds the fastest time in the 4×800 relay as well.
Bosch and Landhuis both had good showings in the 800m as they hit the auto mark in that event as well. Bosch finished sixth with a time of 2:14.01 and Landhuis finished 13th with a time of 2:15.36. The NW women earned seven top 25 finishes on the day. The track team will next travel to Crete, Nebraska, to compete in the two-day GPAC Indoor Championship.
