The women’s track and field team concluded an impressive performance at the Tiger Track Classic at Auburn University on April 1-2, as they recorded 24 top-10 finishes during the event.
Success for the Crimson Tide came early, as they compiled seven top-10 performances in the javelin and hammer throw on the first day.
In the hammer throw event, the Tide placed four athletes in the top-10. Freshman Aoife Hickey led the squad, as she came in sixth with a score of 168-6. Hickey was followed by junior Amethyst Holmes whose score of 167-11 placed her in seventh tenth place was shared by seniors Angelica Howard and Jasmine Williams with scores of 155-8.
Senior Meghan Austin led the way for the Tide in the javelin with her third place finish, a score of 150-2. Junior Brittany Hines finished seventh with a score of 133-0 and was followed in 10th place by sophomore Bekah Hoppis with a score of 126-3.
Along with impressive scores, a growing sense of competition has amassed, as the team trains and attempts to improve their game by challenging each other.
“They train every single day together and as one person takes it up to a higher level, the other people take it up to a higher level,” head coach Sandy Fowler said. “Between Brittany (Hines), Bekah Hoppis and Meghan Austin, that’s starting to happen. You can see the consistency in their throws is getting higher.”
On the second day of competition, Alabama accumulated 17 top-10 finishes to add to its impressive showing in the field events.
Senior Devon Romero recorded the first top-10 finish of the day for the Tide, as she finished ninth in the 400-meter dash with her time of 56:47. Junior Leigh Gilmore followed as her time of 2:14.71 put her in sixth place in the 800-meter run.
Three Tide runners finished in the top-10 in the 3,000-meter run. Finishing third, sophomore Andrea Torske recorded a time of 9:58.79. She was followed shortly by fellow sophomore Elsbeth Denton in fourth with a time of 10:02.47, and Leigh Gilmore finished at 10:16.12, which earned her an eighth place finish.
In both the 100 and 400 meter hurdles, the Tide had runners finish in second. Senior Kim Laing, with her time of 13.53, earned a second place finish in the 100 meter hurdles. Senior Talaya Owens grabbed a second place finish in the 400 meter hurdles with a time of 59.55 and Shani Chandler came in at 1:01.95 for fifth place.
Continuing the success, the Tide recorded back-to-back fifth place finishes in 4×100 and 4×400 meter relays.
“As they get comfortable with each other as relay personnel, then they start to drop times even more,” Fowler said. “You figure out, person to person where your place should be to hand off and how fast do I go when I’m running out of the handoff versus the person coming into the handoff.”
Kia Wansley’s performance was the highlight of the day as she recorded the ninth best triple jump in the nation this season with her jump of 41-03.75.
As the Tide heads into crucial meets, including SEC and Regional meets, they must keep the momentum going and stick to their philosophy.
“The philosophy for the year has been moving yourself as an individual forward and do your personal goals and aspirations,” Fowler said. “Now it’s moving forward as a team, because if you’re doing your job as an individual, it’s going to fall together as a team. Now it’s time to meet the team’s goals and aspirations.”
The Tide will continue their season April 8-9 as they visit Athens, Ga., to compete in the Spec Towns Team Invitational.
