Men's track coach Charlie Powell has one goal for the Quakers at the beginning of the indoor season: to qualify for championship meets starting with the IC4As.
"This is only our third meet," Powell said. "We try to get people to qualify for championship meets, such as the Heptagonals, IC4As and eventually the NCAAs."
On Saturday, the Quakers will travel to State College, Pa., to run in the Penn State Open against 15 teams, including Ivy League foe Cornell. In its most recent meet at Navy, the Red and Blue finished second out of five teams, only losing to rival Princeton.
Five individuals on the team have already qualified for the IC4As in seven events. These runners include senior Max Westman (60-meter hurdles and heptathlon), junior John Carelli (long jump and triple jump), senior Joey Brown (60-meter dash), freshman Brian Fulton (800-meter) and sophomore Darryll Oliver (1000-meter). Coach Powell is hoping that more runners can qualify for the IC4As at this Saturday's meet in all events ranging from sprints to distance.
"This is early on for us right now," Powell said. "We're trying to get out there and really get things started."
The women's track team will also participate in Saturday's Penn State Open, the team's first meet since Dec. 6. Coach Gwen Harris has a different goal for this meet than Powell does.
"We want to use this meet to look at where we are as a team," Harris said. "Our goal is to get in there, get some good things going and have a good meet."
The Quakers just recently resumed team practice last Saturday and now have had six days together as a team.
Although Harris just wants to see her team perform well overall, there still remains the ultimate goal of qualifying for the ECACs. Senior Whitney Tagliavini has already qualified in the long jump.
"Qualifying for the ECACs is always one of our goals," Harris said. "But for this meet, we really just want to get back into the swing of things."
