The men's track and field team took fifth place at the Indoor Heptagonal Championships in New York City this weekend. Brown emerged with two Ivy League Champions - sprinter Paul Raymond '08 took first in the 60-meter dash and thrower David Howard '08 came in first in the shot put. Princeton won the meet with a total of 154 points, and Cornell, the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia all edged out Brown's 48 points.
"The team struggled during the indoor season battling injuries, and we were missing some of our best runners and jumpers," Raymond said. "But we still wanted to come and perform as best we could this weekend. Representing our school and program, it was great to see guys come up big and perform so well."
The meet started off on an auspicious note for the Bears, as reigning 60-meter dash champion Raymond set out to defend his title for the second consecutive year. He blazed to a winning time of 6.85 and put Brown up on the board early with 10 points.
"Personally, I didn't run well in previous meets," Raymond said. "But my coaches and teammates kept working with me and made sure I stayed positive. Coming into the weekend, I felt I put in the training, and I was very confident I would repeat if I ran my race. I was hoping to qualify for nationals running a faster time in finals, but I was happy to contribute to the team."
Raymond's win allowed Brown to leave New York with both the conference's men' and women's fastest individuals. Thelma Breezeatl '10 won the 60-meter dash on the women's side.
Another big contribution to the Bears' effort came from Jamil McClintock '08. He sprinted his way to a second-place finish in the 60-meter hurdles with a time of 8.08 seconds, and teammate Matthew Jasmin '09 came in fifth at 8.36.
"I was more proud of Matt in the hurdles than myself," said McClintock. "The previous two weeks before Heps, he worked on certain technical issues he had with the hurdles, and to be able to put them together in such a short time and on such a big stage shows how much he focused and how hard he worked."
McClintock said he didn't have the race he had hoped for, losing to his competitor by .01 second.
"Personally, I was disappointed with my performance," McClintock said. "I didn't have a good race, and losing is never fun ... but you learn from everything, and next time I will leave no doubt."
Director of Track and Field Craig Lake praised McClintock for his toughness.
"Jamil has been injured all year ... but he still pulls through in every race," Lake said. "You almost take him for granted because you know he will perform well."
Sean O'Brien '09 put up a sixth-place finish in the 800-meter run with a 1:53.13 and also led the distance medley relay team of Ozzie Myers '08, Nick Sarro '08 and Kevin Cervantes '10 to a fourth-place finish with a time of 9:57.32.
"Ozzie Myers not only scored for the team in the (3,000-meter run), but had a personal best to anchor our men's distance medley relay and was gritty as hell," Lake said. "That is what Heps is all about ... he was lying on the ground for a good while after the race, not able to move from sheer exhaustion."
The key performance in the field came from shot putter David Howard '09, who had his biggest showing when it mattered most. Howard threw a gold medal distance of 58-03.75 feet, to win the Ivy League Championship and put him third on Brown's All-Time Top 10 list.
"On the first day, David did not have a good day, and to watch him bounce back and completely turn things around was incredible," said Lake. "He not only won the Ivy League, but set a huge personal best, provisionally qualified for nationals, and upset (the athlete) who was supposed to be the clear winner from Yale."
Reginald Cole '10 produced a fourth-place finish in the triple jump. His last jump proved to be his most impressive, being both a personal best and a distance good enough to put points on the board for the Bears.
Heps marked the end of the indoor season for most of the Bears, though some will compete at the ECAC Championships this weekend.
Although the Bears dropped from last year's fourth-place finish at Heps, the squad was pleased with the results.
"Our coaches told us just to fight for every point and never settle," said McClintock. "I feel like that is exactly what we did."
