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Track stars leave mark at Holy Cross, LSU

Voner, Krous win in HC meet, Masters, Conner pace star-studded field in the south

By Derek McKinley

Posted on Thursday, April 23rd, 2009, 12:21 am

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With the weather heating up, the University of Maine is looking for some big performances to cap off the season in the coming weeks. This past weekend, the Black Bears headed to the College of the Holy Cross to take on seven teams from across New England.

The men’s team picked up a fourth place finish behind strong efforts in short races. Senior Jhamal Fluellen took second in the 100-meter dash with a time of 11.23 seconds, and sophomore Travis Cook earned second as well with a time of 48.78 seconds in the 400-meter dash. The standing record in the event is 48.05 seconds, set by senior Skip Edwards, who is redshirting this season.

Sophomore James Berry turned in a dominating performance in the pole vault, winning by nearly three feet with a vault of 14′11″. Brian Martel finished third in the event with a vault of 11′5″.

Freshman Donald Clark and sophomore Connor Tarr led the throwers, as Clark finished third in the shotput with a toss of 45′7.75″ and Tarr heaved a hammer 141′5″ to snag third place.

On the track, the distance team missed freshman Riley Masters, who was the lone male competitor at the Louisiana State University Alumni Gold meet. Masters nearly lost his perfect streak of races this outdoor season, but leaned at the line to win in a time of 3:48.52, just two-hundredths of a second faster than the second place finisher.

Other notable efforts came from senior Dan Voner, who claimed victory in the 800-meter run with a time of 1:54.88, and freshman Trevor England, who took third in the long jump and fifth in the triple jump. Junior Miles Bartlett doubled up as well, running the 800 and the 5,000-meter run, but was unable to crack the top five in either event. The men’s 4×100-meter relay team also managed a second place finish.

The women’s team managed second place behind host team Holy Cross, who more than doubled UMaine’s score, winning 294-146.

UMaine performed well in the throws despite the absence of sophomore thrower Rebecca Even for the second meet in a row. Just as they did last weekend, junior Alexandra Krous and freshman Jessica Bond earned the 1-2 finish in the javelin, with Krous taking the win this time after a throw of 128′3″. Senior Maegan Burke nabbed second in the shotput, while senior Sarah Hodgins took fourth in the hammer throw.

The Black Bear women got big wins from senior Lindsay Burlock in the 400 (58.47), Vanessa Letourneau in the 800 (2:14.66) and Brenna Walsh in the 5,000 (18:10.48). Burlock also took second in the 200-meter dash.

The team suffered from the absence of four major point scorers in senior Vicki Tolton, junior Ally Howatt and freshmen Corey Conner and Jesse Labreck, all of whom competed at LSU. The small contingent was led by freshman Corey Conner, who won the 1,500-meter run in 4:35.35.

Ally Howatt competed in the sprint double, finishing the 100-meter dash in nineteenth place and the 200-meter dash in tenth place.

Jesse Labreck competed in the 100-meter hurdles on the same track as LSU alum and Olympian Lolo Jones, who declined to run.

“I was excited because I thought she was going to be there that day, but she didn’t end up showing. It was pretty unreal,” Labreck said.

Labreck took eighth place in 14.37 seconds. She also finished tenth in the long jump, leaping 37′10″.

Vicki Tolton earned fifth place in the school record time of 53.79 seconds and may have shown athletes in her home country what they’re missing out on.

“Having the chance to see the Canadian team compete was a huge eye-opener for me,” Tolton said, a native of Smithers, British Columbia. “I am trying to make the 2009 Canadian 4×400 team to compete in Berlin this August.”

“I don’t have a set time that I want to leave [UMaine] running,” Tolton said. “I just want to graduate knowing that I gave it my all, I ran as fast I could, and I had a great time doing it.”

Canada’s women’s 4×400 relay team qualified as reserves for the Summer Olympics last year.

UMaine will send some athletes to the prestigious Penn Relays this weekend, while others travel back to Durham for a rematch with the University of New Hampshire.