Published January 29, 2010

Fans and athletes poured into the St. Lawrence Newell Field House on Saturday, January 23 for the St. Lawrence Invitational. The SLU men’s track and field team placed second after University of Ottawa while the women’s team also came in second place following University of Rochester. There were a total of 13 scoring teams competing this weekend and a few unattached entries. Both the men’s head track and field coach, John Newman, and the women’s head coach, Kate Curran, were pleased with the results this weekend and agreed that their season is off to a great start.

While Curran said that the team did well across all event groups, there were a few runners that really stood out this weekend. Alyssa Pirinelli ’10 won both the shot put and weight throw. She met both the NCAA qualification in shot put and provisional qualifications in weight throw. She out-threw her opponents in both events by more than two meters. In addition to Pirinelli’s success is that of Wendy Pavlus ’11. Pavlus broke the school record in the one mile race with a time of 5:08.13. Her time was more than a half second faster than the old record held by Laura Clarke in 2007. A few other contributors on the women’s team are Jenna Hulton ‘12, who finished third in the 800 meter race in a time of 2:24.33, and Hillary St. John ’10 placed third running the 3000 meter in 10:45.57. Curran described the last couple of weeks training as vigorous. While she was very pleased with the results of the first meet of the New Year, she says “As the season goes on we’ll look to have even better performances.”

Despite the many injuries that the men’s team faces, Coach Newman has great faith in the team and is proud of the season they have had so far. Newman adds that they are deep in their distance running group. He went on to say that while there are a few holes that still need to be filled, there are many freshmen that are stepping up and bringing great results while seniors and the upper class provide strong leadership for the team. Although the men put up great numbers and it was a team effort to place second, there were a few members that really shined. Dan Ramsey ’11, who placed fourth in nationals last year, finished first in both the mile and the 1000 meters. He set the meet record for the mile, finishing in just 4:16.99 and later ran the 1000 meters in 2:33.12. Teammates Josh LeBlanc ’11 and Michael Fox ‘12 followed behind Ramsey in the 1000 meter race to place third and fourth, respectively.

Another top performer for the men’s track and field team is weight thrower Eric Jones ’10. He placed second at nationals last year and is continuing to improve this year. Jones finished third in this invitational in weight throwing, meeting NCAA qualifications. The Saint’s Distance Medley Relay team, consisting of Josh LeBlanc ‘11, Leif Frymire ‘13, Terrence Fox ‘10, and Michael Fox ‘12, placed second running in 10:57.15.

We look forward to what the rest of the Saints’ seasons bring. They are competing at the Terrier Classic Invitational this weekend in Boston, Massachusetts.