Lobos Complete Day One of Competition in Albuquerque and Boston
New Mexico Track & Field concluded its first day of competition at the David Hemery Valentine Invitational in Boston and the Don Kirby Invitational in Albuquerque on Friday, with 10 new PR’s and two new all-time Top 10 performances between the two meets.
In Albuquerque, Lou-Anne Pouzancre Hoyer ran the third-fastest 400m in program history en route to an event win and Lauren Fowler joined the 20-foot club in the long jump to move to No. 4 on the all-time list — in Boston, Hanna Bruckmayer and Mercy Kirarei put down two 5,000m times that would rank first and second on the current Mountain West indoor list.
Day Two of competition begins tomorrow for both meets – go to GoLobos.com/TrackResults for links to live results and FloTrack streams for both events, all in the same place.
THE ACTION FROM BOSTON
Gabriella K. Szabo and Harriet Tuson made their sea-level debut to open the day up for UNM, with Szabo beating her previous elevation conversion from the UNM Team Open by .36 seconds while finishing in 2:10.6 (60th place). Behind her, Tuson finished in 2:12.30.
A week after recording a personal best in the 800m that still stands as the fastest in the conference, Klara Dess shaved more than three seconds off her previous mile best with a 4:42.16 finish that ranks fifth on the Mountain West indoor list.
In the women’s 3,000m, Sophia McDonnell put down a personal best for the first time since February 2022 with her 9:30.50 finish ahead of Semira Mebrahtu Firezghi (9:33.09).
Two more PR’s for a pair of Lobo newcomers in the women’s 5,000m closed out the day for UNM’s east coast contingent, with Mercy Kirarei (16:14.89) and Hanna Bruckmayer (16:18.90) putting down times that would rank as the two fastest on the Mountain West indoor list. Through just three meets, Kirarei has ran the fastest women’s 3,000m and 5,000m races in the Mountain West as well as the fourth-fastest mile. Bruckmayer ranks second in the MW in the 5,000m and sixth in the mile behind Dess’ new PR.
THE ACTION FROM ALBUQUERQUE
Brodie Young opened things up with a first-place finish in the unseeded men’s 400m dash, finishing in 47.25 seconds (47.38 converted) ahead of Tim Harris (7th, 48.95) and Levente Soos (9th, 49.27). Harris’ time was a new personal best and Soos’ finish was just six hundredths of a second shy of matching his previous best set at the UNM Collegiate Classic last week (49.21).
Lauren Fowler set a new personal best in the women’s long jump (6.10m, 20′ 0¼”) that stands as the fourth-best in program history – she’s only the fourth female UNM athlete to break the 20” in indoor program history. That mark secured her 10th place ahead of Mikyla Harkley (5.67m, 18′ 7¼”), Zennia Gonzalez (5.47m, 17′ 11½”), Carlotta Duenninger (5.12m, 16′ 9¾”) and Lilee Kaasch (5.09m, 16′ 8½”).
In the women’s 400m, Lou-Anne Pouzancre Hoyer broke 54 seconds for the first time in her career, winning the event with a 53.84 raw time (53.95 converted) that ranks as the seventh-fastest ran by any French woman this year and moves her into the No. 3 spot on the UNM all-time list. That time would rank among the Top 75 in the nation on the most recent NCAA D-I Indoor Qualifying list and could put her in the discussion for representing France at the 2024 Olympics. The 20-year-old came close to running sub-54 in each of UNM’s last two meets, posting a 54.51 last week at the UNM Collegiate Classic on Feb. 2 and a 54.16 at the UNM Team Open on Jan. 27 — the latter time ranked No. 2 on the conference indoor list.
Behind her, Annamaria Leszczynska came a 10th of a second short of her previous best with a 56.47 raw time (56.58 converted) to finish 12th, with Analisa Ibarra (29th, 57.82) and Hanna Kiess (35th, 58.09) rounding things out. Ibarra’s 57.71 raw finish converts to a time just one hundredth of a second behind her personal best (57.81). Kiess’ time is her fourth PR in her last three meets.
UNM’s lone distance runner on Day One, Camille Jackson finished 19th overall in the women’s 3,000m with a 11:15.02 raw time.
Jose Cornejo led the way in the unseeded men’s 200m, finishing third in heat four and 21st overall with a 21.97 modified time ahead of Elijah Jefferson (23rd, 22.02), Tim Harris (43rd, 22.65) and Jonah Vaquera (51st, 23.50).
On the women’s side, Fowler (24.44) finished 10th overall, followed by Ophelia Pulley (73rd, 25.73), Hanna Kiess (80th, 25.97), Carlotta Duenninger (93rd, 26.81), Nia Mamuya (98th, 27.54) and Malia Dumlao (105th, 29.17).
Kiara Quezada-Arzate (3.98m, 13′ ¾”) and Maja Gebauer (3.98m, 13′ ¾”) went 1-2 in their flight of the women’s “B” pole vault, with Isabel Thomas and Alyssa Gregory both clearing 3.83m (12′ 6¾”) for sixth and seventh place, respectively. Thomas’ mark was her first personal best in over four years. UNM’s lone male pole vaulter, Kyle Hatler produced a new pole vault personal best for the second consecutive week and third time this season en route to a ninth-place finish in his section (4.82m, 15′ 9¾”).