M. Track places first at Heps

Over and over again, the Penn men's indoor track team said that its ultimate goal of the indoor season was to win the Heptagonal Championships at Harvard. The Quakers realized their aspirations on Saturday by coming away with a convincing victory in the nine-team field. The Penn victory was made possible by an intense team effort, with 26 of 32 Quakers competitors recording season or personal bests. The Heptagonal Championships are the premier end-of-the-year track meet for the Quakers' team. It is a two-day competition featuring all eight teams from the Ivy League and Navy. The teams competed in 19 events -- a true test of both physical and mental toughness. The Quakers came out of this intense competition ahead of the field, with 121 team points, far ahead of second-place Princeton's 97.5. With the victory, the Quakers dethroned three-time defending champion Princeton and at the same time snapped a 13-year dry spell in the indoor Heps. Penn entered the competition both excited and ready to run. After the first day's events, however, the Quakers were looming in fourth place. In fact, after nine of the 19 events, the Quakers were still in the middle of the pack. Although this seems to be a slow start, for Penn, it was more than satisfactory. "The score was deceiving at first," Penn sophomore jumper and hurdler Dan Nord said. "We knew we could score more points late in the day so we just had to be in the hunt." The first half of the meet consisted of events in which Penn has not been seasonally or traditionally strong. These included a medley of distance runs and some field events. The distances did not fail Penn in the Heps, as the Quakers "stole" a few points and set themselves up to take over in the stronger events. "The key was to stay relaxed and focused after the first few events," Quakers sophomore Robin Martin said. "It's easy to get excited and nervous, but that's not what we needed. If we kept our focus, I knew we could pull through." The Quakers more than lived up to expectations in their specialties. Directly following the distance events was the pole vault. Led by junior John Linhart, the Quakers placed three competitors in the top six, earning 14 team points and vaulting Penn into second place with nine events to go. Then came the 55-meter dash, which was possibly the turning point of the meet. The Quakers were still trailing going into the 15th event, when the Penn sprinters decided to step up. Senior captain Greg Davis led this group by sprinting to victory in a time of 6.41 seconds. Two other Penn sprinters earned points, giving the Quakers 17 team points for the event and pushing Penn into first place for the first time. "Greg [Davis] ran an amazing race," Martin said. "Watching him got the rest of the team pumped up and set the tone for the final events." And a resounding tone it did set. The Quakers did not look back for the rest of meet as they relied on their highly dependable jumping core to put the fading second-place Tigers away. The triple jump proved to be the nail in the coffin, as the Quakers rallied behind Nord and placed four competitors in the top six. Nord jumped a personal best of 15.42 meters, leading the Penn triple jump crew which earned a total of 24 points in the event. Heps ended with an overwhelming Quakers victory, which shocked defending champion Princeton. Having once lost to the Orange and Black in a season meet, the Quakers came together this time and each member did exactly what he had to do in order to earn a championship for Penn. This feat hadn't been accomplished all season and there was doubt going into Heps. "I knew that we could put together a winning effort, but I wasn't sure that we would because it hadn't happened all season," Martin said. The shocking thing about the victory is not that the Quakers defeated the Tigers or that Penn hasn't won an indoor Heps title since 1984. Penn is traditionally a stronger outdoor squad, and the Quakers pride themselves on the outdoor season, not the indoor one. "Our training and the indoor season is based on preparing us for the outdoor season," Nord said. "The fact that we're this far ahead at this point is a great sign."