The Penn men's and women's track teams work very hard all year in hopes of an Ivy League championship, but with the Heptagonal Championships over, the time has come for some athletes to pursue individual goals.
Throughout the season, many Quakers have posted impressive times to elevate them to the next level of collegiate track and field.
Today, the Penn women will be traveling to St. Lawrence University in Canton, N.Y., for the Eastern College Athletic Conference championships and Saturday. ECACs feature 47 teams and many more individual athletes from all three NCAA divisions.
Only the top teams and individuals on the East Coast between Maine and North Carolina are permitted to attend.
In the field events recent first-team All-Ivy selection and back-to-back Heptagonal champion Charity Payne will be competing in the shot put. Second-team All-Ivy selection -- and newly crowned Ms. Penn -- Samantha Crook will launch her toned body over the bar in the pole-vault competition.
At the Rider-Lafayette Invitational on Feb. 12 several of Penn's female runners earned the right to compete in ECACs, some in several events. Senior Izu Emeagwali qualified in the 55-meter dash, 200m dash and as a member if the 4x400m relay team. It will be a chance to see how the younger Penn athletes, who have had great indoor seasons, hold up against the most elite runners on the East Coast.
Some members of the Penn men's team will be traveling to the Intercollegiate Association of Amateur Athletes of America Indoor Track and Field Championships in Boston -- the equivalent of the women's ECACs. Sophomore Grafton Ifill will be competing in the 200m, an event in which he broke the school record twice this season. Freshman John Guzman will be looking for a solid performance in the 1,000m.
In the field events, Neil Wojdowski will be competing in the pole-vault, after posting impressive marks all season. Pete Habegger will be competing in the long jump.
Other members of the men's team including Courtney Jaworski and distance runner Nolan Tully will be traveling to South Bend, Ind., for Notre Dame's Alex Wilson Invitational. This meet is often called a "last-chance meet" because it provides athletes with one more opportunity to post a qualifying mark for next week's NCAA national championship meet.
Jaworski will be running the 800m, Tully the 3000m, and a distance medley team of Jaworski, Eric Ljungquist, Tim Kaijala and Stephen Hayes will be competing.
"It's a pretty cool meet," assistant coach Jamie Cook said. "It's a matter of how the race unfolds, they're all ready to do well."
