Crabo Wins SCIAC Steeplechase Title in Track
The men's track and field team successfully completed the first day of competition at the 2009 Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC) Championships.
Day one of the championships consisted of preliminary rounds in sprint, hurdle and middle distance events and finals in hammer, javelin, long jump, shot put, pole vault and the 3,000m steeplechase.
By far the most impressive performance of the day was delivered by freshman Anders Crabo, in the 3,000m steeplechase. Crabo, who recently ran a personal best time of 9:27.61 at the renowned Mt. SAC Relays, came into this race brimming with confidence.
Crabo used the first portion of the race to size up the field and the latter half was devoted to systematically picking off conference foes. "With a lap remaining it was obvious that the race belong to him", commented head coach Tony Boston. Boston continued, "Once Crabo seized lead, he continued to apply pressure on the field and managed to open a sizable gap between himself and the top seeded runner." Anders Crabo won the race with a time 9:23.55, claiming his first collegiate track and filed title.
This time leaves Anders just short of the 9:23.00 NCAA provisional qualifying standard. Anders will have two more attempts to qualify for nationals in the steeplechase (Steve Scott Invitational 5/2 and the Oxy Invitational 5/9). He hopes to join teammates John Mering (1500m), John Lewis (110HH) and Torrey Olson (10,000m) who have already achieved NCAA provisional marks.
As a team, the Sagehens did quite well in the prelims. The Pomona-Pitzer squad will have athletes competing in the finals of every running event -- a grand accomplishment for such a young team.
Qualifying for the Finals
100m: John Lewis (Fr)
200m: John Lewis (Fr)
400m: Ryan Meyer (Fr)
800m: Colin Flynn (Fr), Wynton Marsalis (Jr)
1500m: Colin Flynn (Fr), Hale Shaw (Fr)
110mH: John Lewis (Fr), Cameron Kinslow (So)
400mH: Cameron Kinslow (So)
Finals will be held on Monday at Occidental College.
