Tolbert wins opening Relays race

Vancy's Ryan TolbertVancy's Ryan Tolbertwins the 400-meterVancy's Ryan Tolbertwins the 400-meterhurdles in photo-finish Early yesterday morning, Penn's campus began to fill with pretzel vendors, t-shirt salesmen and thousands of championship-hopeful runners. For the 102nd consecutive year, the Penn Relay Carnival returned to Franklin Field. After two days of decathlon and pentathlon competition, the Relays kicked off in full force yesterday at 10:30 a.m. with the women's college 400-meter hurdles championship. From the crack of the gun, Vanderbilt's Ryan Tolbert and Auburn's Eusheka Bartley pulled ahead of the pack. Tolbert and Bartley ran neck-and-neck down the track and appeared to tie to the finish line. Although the crowd was unable to tell whether Tolbert or Bartley had crossed the line first, the scorers announced Tolbert as the winner with an official time of 57.63 seconds. Bartley's official time was announced as 57.64. Tolbert's narrow victory set the pace for the following races -- marked by photo-finishes and a number of upsets. Once the cheers from the Vanderbilt faithful subsided, attention turned from the hurdles to the 4x800, the day's first relay. In the first heat, the Mount St. Mary's relay team of Aisha Stevens, Amy DeBor, Robin Kloster and Heather Moul raced to a first-place finish in 8 minutes, 51.56 seconds. Mount St. Mary's time was four seconds faster than second-place Pittsburgh. Princeton finished far behind in 11th place in the 15-team field. In the second section of the 4x800, a strong final leg paced Massachusetts to a first-place finish in 9:11.03. The Quakers crossed the finish-line in 9:14.40, placing second in the heat to the Minutemen. Next up were the championship-qualifying heats of the 4x100 relay, the shortest distance relay on the schedule. The qualifiers in the 4x100 included No. 1 LSU, No. 3 Texas and No. 6 Illinois, along with Central State, Abilene Christian and North Carolina. The Longhorns ran the fastest 4x100 relay among the qualifiers in 45.12 seconds. The Longhorns' performance in the 4x100 was surprising, since Texas coach Bev Kearney had anticipated the 4x100 to be the weakest of the Texas relay teams. "We should be very strong, but inexperienced in the 4x100-meter," Kearney said. "The 4x200-meter and 4x400-meter relays should do even better." Although the Longhorns could not improve upon their 4x100 place in the 4x400 qualifying race, the 4x400 relay team advanced to the championships that will be held tomorrow evening. Led by All-Americans Toya Brown and Suziann Reid, Texas finished first in the 4x400 with a time of 3:35.44 -- three seconds ahead of second place George Mason. In the 4x400 heat composed of Heptagonal teams, the Brown foursome of Ava Cato, Tanya Hall, Aisha Stroop and Meremru Chikwenda were first to cross the finish line in 3:47.50 and advanced to the championship. The Quakers 4x400 relay team finished fifth in 3:57.30. Other teams advancing to the finals of the 4x400 include LSU, Penn State, Northeastern, Virginia Commonwealth, Maryland-Eastern Shore, East Stroudsburg, City University of New York, Nevada-Las Vegas and Essex Community College. In the closest of all the 4x400 heats, Essex defeated Kentucky by just .05 seconds. In addition to the sprint relays, the College Women's Distance Medley Relay Championship of America was held in the afternoon. Georgetown dominated the distance medley. The Hoyas team of Miesha Marzell, Amy Ross, Julian Reynalds and Jolie Staheli finished first in 11:07.69. Villanova, whose 1988 distance medley team broke the world record at the Penn Relays, finished a respectable third. Wildcats freshman Carrie Tollefson ran a strong first leg, finishing in 3:26.3, despite little experience in the event. "We just don't have the experience we traditionally do," Villanova coach John Marshall said last week. Tomorrow afternoon, the collegiate women's action continues with the 100-meter hurdles and the 100-meter dash.

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