During the first two weeks of the outdoor season, the Penn women's track team finished with strong results, demolishing Rutgers, La Salle, Rowan, St. Joseph's and East Stroudsburg. At last Saturday's Quaker Invitational, the Red and Blue broke one school record, ran over Ivy League rival Princeton on the track, and threw and jumped their way to a combined five first place finishes -- one more than national-powerhouse Temple. But the Owls returned with a vengeance to Franklin Field -- the location of their shocking defeat a week ago -- along with a powerful field consisting of Northeastern and Penn State, along with always tough Ivy rivals Cornell and Princeton. The 14-team field outperformed the Quakers on most aspects at Saturday's University of Pennsylvania Invitational, holding the Red and Blue to zero first places and, in a few events, completely out of the placing. "I think this is definitely the most cohesive, the most talented team [we've had] overall," Penn senior Melanie Gesker said. "But we need to work on little technical things, like relay hand-offs and being consistent." Even with Saturday's lackluster performance, the Quakers still appear to be the dominant team in the Ivy League. Cornell junior Becky Denison finished first in the 800-meter run, and Princeton's Nicole Harrison finished first in the 100 hurdles. But overall, the Red and Blue were far more competitive than either the Big Red or the Tigers. Penn junior Michelle Belsley finished second in the 800, with a career-best time of 2 minutes, 12.64 seconds -- just one stride behind Denison. Penn sophomore high jumper Tiffany Archer also earned a second-place finish, with a season-best jump of 5 feet, 8 inches. And the Quakers' long-jump performance was spectacular for the third-consecutive week. For the first time in the outdoor season, Penn freshman Lisa El was did not place in the long jump. But freshman Aquiyla Muhammad and Kimberly Mason picked up the slack, finishing second and third, respectively, in the long jump. "I think that we're are all very competitive, " Mason said. "We all want to do well and like to see who can come out on top each meet. But we also support each other." Saturday's U of P Invitational also saw the emergence of the Penn 4x100 relay team. The Quakers 4x100 team, which was inconsistent in the first two meets, finished a very respectable second, just 0.25 seconds behind Temple's unbeaten 4x100 racers. Penn's 48.52 time was also a season-best. One disappointing event for the Red and Blue on Saturday was the shot put. Freshman Luana Botelho, who broke the school record a week ago, slipped to seventh place with a 12.44 meter throw.
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