Day 1 Results (PDF)
Official Great Midwest Championships Page
HILLSDALE, Mich. – Eight different meet records were shattered on day one at the Great Midwest Athletic Conference Men’s & Women’s Indoor Track & Field Championships housed at Hillsdale’s Biermann Athletic Center on Friday.
A handful of preliminary events were completed along with some of the longer distance track races and field events, including jumps and throws.
Three different overall conference records were broken or tied (women’s weight throw, men’s long jump, men’s weight throw) today.
Early on, Hillsdale leads the women’s team scoring with 40 points followed closely by Walsh (30) and Malone. The nationally-ranked Findlay men have a lead on the rest of the pack with 53 points while Walsh (44) and defending champion Malone (41) among others are in hot pursuit.
Preliminary times also count towards conference overall/meet records and will be recalculated with the conclusion of Saturday’s scheduled events.
For the first time in conference history, a pentathlon champion took her place on the awards podium in the multis events as Lake Erie’s Hailey Nielsen started what would turn out to be an exciting day.
Nielsen racked up 2,991 points between the 60-meter hurdles, high jump, shot put, long jump and 800-meter run to bring a title home for the Storm and first-year head coach Giles Davis’ program. She won the long jump and 800 while finishing second in the 60m hurdles and high jump.
Malone junior provisional qualifier Hannah Thompson broke the 5K championship meet record with a time of 17:03.53, about 37 seconds faster than last year’s time. Ursuline’s Janelle Perry made waves in the long jump as the undisputed favorite and recorded the second-longest distance in conference history at 5.86m.
The biggest ‘upset’ of the afternoon came in the form of defending league champ Crystal Hopkins of Kentucky Wesleyan in the weight throw. Hopkins came through with a huge PR of 18.12m, much to the delight of head coach Tony Rowe, to topple favored seeds Rachael Tolsma (Hillsdale) and Alex DeVincentis (Findlay).
Closing out the night with a great storyline was the women’s distance medley relay as Walsh edged out Hillsdale by about three seconds in a battle of cross country champs/runner-ups. Anchoring each team was NCAA Cross Country All-Americans Sarah Berger (Walsh) and Hannah McIntyre (Hillsdale).
Walsh’s Mark Hadley was the winner of the 5K race with a time of 14:53.65, good for a top-10 mark in conference history.
The only record untouched for either the conference meet or all-time was the men’s pole vault as Hillsdale’s Jared Schipper closed in on former Cedarville’s NCAA qualifier James Blackwell’s height.
The host Chargers also won the men’s distance medley relay event with the group of Nathan Jones, Konnor Malone, Adam Wade and Joseph Humes, in order – combining for a new meet record by almost 40 seconds.
Findlay’s Trey Everett, held out of the men’s pentathlon as an auto qualifier already as a national favorite, matched his conference record of 7.22m for the long jump crown. Teammate Austin Combs put on a show in the throws cage with his second auto-qualifying distance in weight throw, demolishing the previous meet record with a distance of 21.40m.
Men’s multis events resume tomorrow morning at 9 a.m. ET in the heptathlon. Team champions will be crowned along with track athletes, field athletes, freshmen and coaches of the meet during the awards ceremony.