by Matt Kennedy
The Colorado Mesa Track and Field team are on the final stretch of their indoor season and they traveled to Gunnison on Saturday to compete in the Western State Alumni Open.
It was a solid performance for the Mavericks over the weekend, the men’s throw was a spectacular start to the day where four personal records for the Mavericks were broken. Trevor Jensen led the charge in that event where he won with a throw of 16.63m. Christopher Walker followed behind his teammate coming in second with a throw of 16.32m.
Jensen also did very well in the men’s shot put event where he came in third behind two Western throwers but he did manage to have a solid throw of 14.90m.
In the men’s long jump, Vernon Jackson came in second when he leaped to an impressive jump of 6.72m.
In the men’s triple jump fellow Maverick, Peter Greco, won the event with a jump of 13.69m.
The women did their part as well; Quincey Pederson placed second in the women’s high jump where she leaped 1.53m and teammates, Erica White and Natalee Todd, followed her as the two came in third and fourth.
In the pole vault, Gabriella Casey threw herself into second place with a score of 3.40m and Danielle Pickert placed third in the weight throw throwing a distance of 14.65m.
In the track portion of the meet on Saturday, speed was the key as the Mavericks performed significantly on the track against Western.
In the women’s 60m hurdles, Mekayla Winchester dominated the sprint as she came within .02 seconds of the school record when she crossed the finish line with a time of 8.87 seconds. The Mavericks had four runners finish within the top five of the 60m Hurdles.
Michael Fera was one of the other standouts over the weekend. He ran a provisional mark in the men’s 800m run when he came in second with a time of 1:56.73. He also ran the fastest split for the 4×400 men’s relay.
Head coach Brian Beeman gave high praise for his team over the weekend but also stated there was, “still a lot to work on heading near RMAC.” Beeman emphasized on how his runners and throwers are always “hungry” and wanting to do better especially since the Indoor RMAC Championships are only three weeks away.
Other events Colorado Mesa dominated in was the 400m dash where the Mavericks had three runners finish in at the top. Matt Miller won the event with a time of 52.40 followed by Marc Garcia, who also ran well in the 4×400 relay.
The season will soon transfer to the outdoor season which is where the athletes will most likely be more comfortable with their running. Outdoor tracks are what they are used to training on, but Beeman said how the team was eager to “run at altitude in Gunnison and see what kind of toll it takes on their bodies.”
Beeman encourages his runners to “to do their very best, because their best is where we are at as a team” and he emphasized the fact his team works extremely hard as they go into every meet hungry and willing to perform at a high level.
It was a solid performance for Colorado Mesa over the weekend and they should be very confident heading into the Indoor RMAC Championships as well as transferring to the outdoor season in about a month.
Colorado Mesa will head back down to Gunnison on Feb. 18 where they will compete against Western State once again in the Western State Open.
