Women’s Track Posts Strong Finishes At Smith College Invitational Meet
Issue   |   Wed, 12/09/2015 - 00:36

The Amherst women’s indoor track team kicked off its regular season competition this past weekend, traveling to Northampton for the Smith College Invitational Meet.

Sophomore Becki Golia highlighted the day for Amherst, earning the team’s only first-place finish of the meet. She took first in the high jump posting a 1.62-meter jump.

The purple and white competitors performed well in field events. Louise Atadja ’16 took 16th overall, jumping 4.65 meters.

Two first-years carried Amherst in the triple jump. Emily Flaherty ’19 and Yrenly Yuan ’19 recorded seventh and ninth place finishes respectively with Flaherty jumping 9.92 meters and Yuan jumping 9.57 meters.

In the track events, both the sprinters and distance runners found success.

Kaeli Mathias ’18 raced to a 12th-place finish in the mile with a time of 5:59.67.

Amherst placed two runners in the top-15 finishers in the 600-meter run. Leonie Rauls ’18 crossed the line in fourth place, finishing in 1:43.20. Danielle Griffin ’18 finished in 11th place with a time of 1:48.37.

Amherst’s 4 x 400-meter relay team posted a speedy time of 4:07.75 to take second place in the event and also qualify for the ECAC championship meet later in the season. The team consisted of Victoria Hensley ’16, Rauls, Griffin and first-year Julia Asin.

“It’s exciting that we qualified this early in the season,” Hensley said. “With so many more chances to practice and compete together, I can’t wait to see how much we can improve our time by then.”

The team will now be off for winter break before returning to action at the Little Three championships on Saturday, Jan. 16. They will look to improve upon a third-place finish at last year’s meet.