Alabama men’s track and field team finished seventh at the Southeastern Conference Indoor Championships in Fayetteville, Ark., over the weekend.
The Crimson Tide came away from the meet totaling 47 points, which was the most the team has earned in the meet since 2006. In the SEC, finishing seventh means the team is on par with some of the nation’s top teams.
“It is always very misleading,” coach Harvey Grant said. “It’s a tough conference. It’s like a pre-NCAA meet. You can have top notch performances and still not make a final.”
Due to the tough competition within the conference, the Tide may have seen a sneak peek at what the NCAA Indoor Championships will look like in two weeks. Many of the runners the Tide was up against will also compete in nationals.
“It was just like racing in the national championships,” Glance said. “In the 60-meters you had probably eight of the top 12 sprinters in the country.”
Kirani James proved to everyone once again that he is one of the nation’s fastest at 400 meters, coming in second and posting a junior world record. James, who ran a slower preliminary time, was placed in the slower of the two groups and did not race head to head-to-head against the world leader and eventual winner, University of Georgia’s Torrin Lawrence.
“It was a split race,” Glance said. “It will end up showing in the results that he [Kirani] came in second place, but he won his section by six or seven meters.”
The Tide will travel to South Bend, Ind., for the Alex Wilson Invitationals this weekend in what Glance is calling the team’s “last chance meet.” For the Tide the meet serves as an opportunity for athletes who are on the boarder to post qualifying times for nationals.
“We got three event that we are shooting at, I call them our three bullets,” Glance said. “ The 800-meter with Fred [Samoei], the 4×400 and Tyson [David] in the 5000-meter. If we can just get one of those bullets it will increase our individual chances at All-Americans and also our team’s chances at scoring points.”
Even though the Alex Wilson Invitational is only one week before nationals, Glance said he plans to go all out in order to get as many athletes to qualify as possible. Though the many of the Tide’s athletes will not have the luxury of a week off before nationals, Glance said he is not concerned.
“Sometimes a week off will help people and sometimes it hurts people,” Glance said. “It depends on your preparation and we always been very careful on how we prepared.”
Glance said that he was optimistic on the team’s chances going into nationals saying all his athletes need to do is get there
“Anything can happen once you get there,” Glance said. “ A hiccup here or there can determine who is an All-American and who isn’t.”
