WENHAM, Mass. – The Roger Williams University Men's and Women's Track & Field teams captured titles at Commonwealth Coast Championship meet at Gordon on Saturday. Numerous personal best were set throughout the day to pace each team to their respective titles.
Freshman, Lindsey Williams (Guilford, Conn.) took first in both the long jump and the high jump while placing second in the triple jump with a personal best jump of 10.20m. On the men's side senior Evan Jones (Lexington, Mass.) placed 2nd in the triple jump while jumping on a strained hamstring with a leap of 12.26. Jamie Goodwick (Newtown, Conn.) placed third in the long jump. Austin Bobrow (Rocky Hill, Conn.) lead the jumpers placing first in the triple jump with a personal best jump of 13.29 and first place in the long jump with a leap of 6.33. "Coach Thomas spoke proudly, "This is Austin's senior year and he had an amazing day to solidify a great year of training and competition. You could tell when he stepped on the track today that he was ready to compete. During the long jump, he had to run straight from jumping to running in the 4x100 and then back to jumping and he never let it get him off of his game. Our jumpers had an amazing day today, almost every jumper set a personal best today in both the triple jump. They have worked extremely hard and it is great to see their hard work paying off."
Sophomore Megan Breault (Agawam, Mass.) left the track with two wins and two second place finishes. Breault's triple jump of 10.82m was the best of the day and qualified her for the New England Meet. Her second win came in the 100 meter hurdles followed by a second place finish in the 200 meter dash and second place finish in the 400 meter hurdles. Breault was edged out by sophomore teammate, Hannah Noel (Adams, Mass.) who won the event.
Thomas Franco (Ridgefield, Conn.) had a strong showing for the men winning the 200 meter dash in (23.84) and finished a close second .01 behind first in the 100 meter with a time of (10.68).
Maria Brenner (Shrewsbury, Mass.) and Maria LoBalbo (Bethel, Conn.) both ran great races in the 400 meter dash placing first and second respectively.
The women's 4x100 relay team of Meghan Krauss (Holliston, Mass.) Noel, Breault, and Lara Whelan (Melrose, Mass.) set a season best mark of (51.2) only .2 away from qualifying for ECAC.
Courtney Anderson (Palmer, Mass.) threw the hammer in a personal best throw of 36.50m almost 10m ahead of the competition. Shannon Pitt (West Chester, Pa.) placed second in the discus throw and Cassidy Hammond (Canaan, Conn.) placed third in the javelin. For the men, Emil Pornelous (Hartford, Vt.) placed first in the discus and shot put and second in the hammer.
Piper Gianforte (Cazenovia, N.Y.) added point to the team total placing second in the pole vault.
Junior Steve Carnevale (Easton, Mass.) finished first in the 400 meter event lowering his personal best time to (51.1).
Freshman, Hannah Zydanowicz (Newington, Conn.) won the 800 meter race, setting the school record with a time of (2:24). On the men's side, sophomore, David Fitol (East Hampton, Conn.) won the 800 meters with a time of (2:06).
Senior Alex Honkala (South Royalton, Vt.) won the 1500 meter event, matching her career best time of 5:01. Juniors, Nina Groseclose (Baltimore, Md.) and Lauren Riccardi (Reading, Mass.) also set personal records in the 1500 meters with times of 5:09 and 5:10 respectively. For the men, freshman, Kevin (Terbush Burnt Hills, N.Y.) put up a personal record in the 1500 meters winning the race with a time of (4:18).
In the 5000 Meter events Jamie Wandzilak (Wantagh, N.Y.) placed 2nd in the women's race with a time of 21:01 and Sophomore Jeremy Kacher (Waltham, Mass.) finished third in the men's event running a new personal best (17:05).
Dan Herbein (York, Maine) won took steeple chase clocking a time of (11:14).
Coach Thomas summed up the day, "We have an amazing and very talented group of athletes. The TCCC Meet is a great meet to see how our athletes perform against other teams in our conference. Today every single athlete went out to the track and gave it everything that they had. This meet we saw a number of school records broken, personal best, and qualifying marks for the New England meet. It was a great way to end the 2012 Regular Season."
