NCAA West Preliminary Championships — Austin, Texas
When: Thursday-Saturday, May 28-30
Where: Mike A. Myers Stadium in Austin, Texas
As the saying goes, everything is bigger in Texas. And for the Lobos venturing to the Lone Star State this week, that much is true.
This weekend, the meet is bigger, the competition is bigger and the goal is bigger.
The University of New Mexico track and field team is aiming for the national championships as it sends 22 individuals and a relay team to the 2015 NCAA Division I Men’s and Women’s Outdoor Track and Field West Preliminary Championships competition this week.
The Lobos are eyeing top-12 finishes in their respective events during the three-day meet at Mike A. Myers Stadium in Austin, which would advance a competitor to next month’s NCAA Championships in Eugene, Ore.
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| Alex Herring |
And, at a large meet against the best of the west, New Mexico will need strong performances to claim a top-12 finish and advance as many athletes as possible.
The top 48 athletes and top 24 relay teams in the NCAA West Region qualify to the NCAA West Prelims, which amounts to about 1,600 athletes vying for a limited number of bids to the NCAA finals.
But, the Lobos have had success advancing athletes through to the national championships, with eight qualifying last year, six in both 2012 and 2013, and nine in 2011.
This year’s group of Lobos can also produce a number of NCAA qualifier, as 11 men, 11 women and a men’s relay team head to Austin.
On the men’s side, NCAA indoor All-American Allan Hamilton leads the pack and is entered in two events.
Hamilton, the Mountain West champion in the long jump and triple jump, has qualified in both events. He is seeded ninth in the long jump with a mark of 25 feet, 6 ¼ inches and 27th in the triple jump with a distance of 50-6 ¾.
An All-American in the long jump indoors, Hamilton has been a steady force for UNM. He’ll also run in the 4×100 meter relay, teaming up with Ridge Jones, Carlos Wiggins and Scott Bajere.
The quartet comes in with a mark of 40.43 seconds that ranks 21st.
| List of Competitors | |
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WOMEN • Tamara Armoush: 1500 MEN • Matt Bergin: 5000 |
Also qualifying to the meet are some veterans of the prelim round, with Peter Callahan, Elmar Engholm and Alex Herring.
Callahan, last year’s fourth-place finisher in the national finals of the 1,500-meter run, heads to Austin seeded fifth in the event. He owns a seed time of 3 minutes, 40.37 seconds.
Engholm, a two-time prelim-round qualifier in the 3000-meter steeplechase will instead run the 1500 this year, and carries the 12th-best seed time of 3:42.26.
Alex Herring returns to Austin after a one-year hiatus, ranking 18th in the 800 with a seed time of 1:48.53.
Matt Bergin and Julian Florez round out the men’s track athletes, with Bergin in the 5000 (28th seed, time of 13:54.31) and Florez in the 10,000 (36th, 29:33.71).
In the field events, New Mexico has a handful of athletes making return trips to the prelims.
Django Lovett has made it through to the NCAA Championships three times in the high jump, and will look to make it a fourth when he puts his 44th-ranked seed mark of 6-11 to the test.
Logan Pflibsen hasn’t been to this meet since 2012, but has the 17th-best clearance in the pole vault, having surpassed 17-3 during the season.
Elsewhere, 32nd-ranked Yannick Roggatz will look to parlay his seed mark of 24-5 into a berth, while javelin throwers Beau Clafton (48th, 203-7) and Michael Ellis (43rd, 205-6) vie to translate their 1-2 finish at conference into bids.
For the women, the Lobos have three qualifiers in both the 1500 and the 3000 steeplechase, with another two in the 10000.
However, five athlete have seeds in the upper half of the region, with Alice Wright and Calli Thackery ranked near the top.
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| Heleene Tambet |
Wright, the MW champ in the 10,000, is seeded third in the west in the event, and comes in with a seed mark of 32:56.33. Thackery, the MW champ in the 1500, will take on the 5000 with her seventh-ranked seed of 15:42.57.
Both have come on strong this year, with Thackery making the NCAA Indoor Championships in March and Wright earning All-American status in cross-country in the fall.
Jannell Hadnot is the third Lobo with a top-10 seed mark, heading to Austin ranked ninth in the triple jump. The conference titlist in the event, Hadnot owns a personal record/seed mark of 42-4 ¼.
In the 1500, Sophie Connor leads three total qualifiers with her time of 4:21.14. She’s seeded 24th, ahead of Tamara Armoush (32nd, 4:22.85) and Amber Zimmerman (39th, 4:24.29).
Zimmerman is also entered in the steeplechase as the No. 34 seed. Her seed time of 10:30.11 is second on the team, behind 26th-seeded Nicola Hood and her seed of 10:25.59 but in front of 39th-seeded Nicole Roberts and her seed of 10:31.09.
Holly Van Grinsven and Heleene Tambet complete the Lobo qualifiers on the track, as Van Grinsven runs the 100 hurdles as the No. 23 seed (13.49) and Tambet takes aim in the 10,000 as the No. 39 seed (34:32.68).
The final Lobo striving for the NCAAs is Casey Dowling, who is seeded 48th in the long jump with a seed of 19-6 ¾.
The meet kicks off for the Lobos on Thursday at 12:30 p.m. MT with the men’s long jump and 6:30 p.m. MT with the women’s 1500. The meet will continue through Friday with UNM action starting at 6 p.m. and concludes around 10 p.m. MT on Saturday.
Check back each day for a quick recap on the Lobos’ action and again on Saturday for a full recap.