M. Track dominates field at Quaker Invitational

After getting off to a slow start at the Raleigh Relays last week, the Penn men's track team needed to get back on track at the Quaker Invitational Saturday. The Quakers made sure they did not have an extended slump by dominating the field of 12 teams at Franklin Field. The meet was not officially scored, but Penn assistant coach Nathan Taylor had the Quakers defeating their closest competitor by a score of 200-60. Penn was not able to draw the upper-level teams it had hoped for to the meet. "I had hoped that the meet would have been more competitive across the board," Taylor said. The disparity was most evident in the field events, where the Quakers claimed most of the top spots. The highlight of the meet was senior thrower Clarence Hinton's toss of 182 feet, 4 inches in the hammer throw. The throw was Hinton's personal record and the seventh best throw on the all-time list for Penn. Equally impressive was freshman Lucas Deines' hammer throw of 162-4, which qualified him for Junior Nationals by more than 20 feet. In the discus, Hinton was able to place second with a throw of 164-2, with Josh Deines' throw of 148-3 inches putting him right behind in third place. The Deines brothers claimed the top two spots in the shot put, with Josh's throw of 46-9 good for first and Lucas' distance of 46-1 placing him second. The jumps were another strong area for the Quakers. In the triple jump, Penn claimed the first four spots, with Dave Davenport leading the way with a jump of 47-3 inches, followed by Randy Simmons, Mike Stiffler and Okinyi Ayungo. Stiffler won the long jump with a distance of 22-6.5, while Aric Shalev won the high jump by clearing 6-9.25. Greg Schroeder finished third in the vault with a height of 15-4. The distance events were highlighted by Aaron McCommon's come-from-behind win in the 1,500 meters with a time of 3 minutes, 58.51 seconds. Freshman Chris Cross was second in the 800 meters with a time of 1:56.3 seconds, while sophomore Matt Wilkinson was second in the 5,000 with a time of 14:50.06. Greg Davis finished second in both the 100 and 200 with times of 10.83 seconds and 21.96 seconds respectively. Carl Eklof claimed two second-place finishes in the hurdle events. He ran the 110 high hurdles in 14.70 seconds and the 400 intermediate hurdles in 53.89 seconds. Even with the Quakers' success at the meet, the most encouraging aspect was the return of junior captain Chris Harper. For two weeks, Harper and the coaches were left in suspense about his future as a runner. At the start of the season, Harper began to experience sharp pains in his chest right above his heart. He underwent a battery of tests, ranging from X-rays to an EKG. Finally, an ultrasound revealed an anomaly in one of his coronary arteries. The defending Heptagonals 100 and 200 champ was left to wonder about whether his career was over while doctors tried to determine if the anomaly was malignant or benign. Fortunately, the anomaly was found to be harmless, and Harper resumed his career Saturday. Harper has gained a new-found appreciation for the sport, which was reflected in his 47.30 second split on Penn's winning 4x400 relay team despite not practicing for three weeks. "I was very pleased with my performance," Harper said. "There was no extraordinary pain and I ran pretty fast." The loss of Harper would have been a severe blow to Penn's quest for the Heps title. Now that he is back and near full strength, the Quakers can continue their march towards Heps knowing that their captain will be leading the way.