Post-break improvement expected from W. Track at Delaware Invite

Before the more prestigious Virginia Tech invite next weekend, women's track gets a tune up at Delaware. After more than a dozen practices, the women's track team is rearing to go as it travels to Delaware today to compete in the Delaware Invitational. Despite the drastic drop in temperature from spring-like weather to normal winter weather, Penn has still been preparing well outdoors for this weekend. The Delaware Invitational serves an important role as it is a "bridge" between last week's Yale Invitational and next week's Virginia Tech Invitational. New Haven provides an attractive location for many northern schools to compete in the Yale Invitational. "Yale was to get the kinks out, find out how you are from Christmas, and get yourself into it," assistant coach Tony Tenisci said. Similar to the Yale situation, the proximity of Virginia Tech attracts primarily southern teams, which tend to be more competitive. The Delaware meet is, in general, less competitive than the Virginia Tech Invitational. Penn hopes that this weekend will serve as the perfect stepping stone and will prepare the team for success at Virginia Tech. "Each meet is designed to get progressively more competitive and to give us better and better times as we get closer to our main goal, which is our conference meet," Tenisci said. "Delaware is an important tune-up to get us ready for the following week. Delaware is a little bit more competitive and a little bit sharper [than Yale]." When the women's track team returned from break two weeks ago, it returned to unseasonably warm weather. The team took advantage of the comfortable temperatures and began a week of intense practice. At the end of the week, the Quakers competed in the Yale Invitational and now it looks to improve in Delaware this weekend. Despite the change in weather to more seasonable temperatures this week, the team has continued to practice and stay focused for the meet. "Our women have always been able to handle the weather and even though it's difficult they've always been very good with it," Tenisci said. "It has never really been something that has really dragged them down. They've worked hard this week and they did a nice job." This meet will focus the team once again, getting the women centered on competing and doing well. "Everyone is going to build from last week. It was our first week back from break," senior captain Jen Roy said. "We are getting readjusted to competing again. Last week was a good start for the first meet back. This week everyone will build on last week." Last week the 4x400 meter relay team placed fourth among the field of competitors, although it failed to qualify by less than a second for the East Coast Athletic Conference Championships (ECAC) in early March. The team looks to rectify that situation this weekend. One leg of the relay team is senior Jessica Mitchell, who qualified for the ECAC Championships last week in the 800-meter while setting a personal record. Roy, the current record holder in the 400m dash, is another leg of the relay team which hopes to help the relay team qualify for ECAC Championships and continue its preparation for next weekend's Virginia Tech meet.