On Saturday, the Penn women’s track and field team battled both Cornell and harsh weather conditions during their dual meet in Ithaca, N.Y.

Saturday wasn’t the first time coach Gwen Harris and the rest of the team heard the sprinters’ rap, but posting three under-25-second 200-meter runners isn’t the result of just a good pump-up song.

Penn edged out the Tigers by six points, 89-83. Yale was a distant third with 25 points.

Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt announced yesterday that he will again be competing at the Penn Relays in the men’s 4x100 relay as part of the USA versus The World event.

Fresh off the Villanova Outdoor Duals and Maryland Invitational, the Penn men’s and women’s track and field teams will return to competition this Saturday. Besides Penn Relays, the Penn Invite will be the Quakers’ only home meet this season.

The men's track team were able to capture titles in several events at the Villanova Duals, while the women's Quakers placed third with 108 points.

The men finished the Intercollegiate Association of Amateur Athletes of America Championships tied for 33rd place among 52 teams, while the women finished 16th among 52 teams at ECACs.

On Saturday, several Quakers will begin competition in the 2010 IC4A Championships, the first meet of the postseason, in which only select athletes will compete.

At Heps, the Penn men finished seventh out of eight teams with 33 points, while the women placed sixth with 48 points.

The indoor track season comes to a boil this weekend as the men’s and women’s track and field teams will travel to Hanover, N.H., to compete in the Indoor Heptagonal Championships.

With 15 events officially in the books, the Penn women currently sit in fifth place out of nine competing teams, while with 16 events scored, the Penn men are fifth out of eleven teams.

While competing in the two-day New Balance Invitational in New York City, five Quakers qualified for the ECAC Championships, bringing Penn’s total number of qualifiers to six.

Although the Quakers competed in six preseason exhibitions, veteran coach Charlie Powell stressed that last semester’s results were not suitable indicators for what to expect when the season kicks off in earnest Saturday with the Penn State Northeast Challenge at State College.

Women’s track coach Gwen Harris is looking to the past to aid her team’s future.

The Red and Blue travel to Annapolis, Md., for the Navy Invitational with the hope of upsetting powerhouse Princeton.

In one of the tightest races men’s cross country coach Charlie Powell has witnessed, 58 runners finished between 25:00 and 25:20 at Friday’s Paul Short Invitational.

With 62 points, the women placed second among the 21 teams competing, unable to top Ivy League opponent Harvard, who finished with 44 points. Harvard freshman Sammy Silva won the race in 22:35.43.