Track Gears Up for Heps

For three years in a row, the men's Outdoor Heptagonal Championship has been won by Princeton and the women's Outdoor Heptagonal Championship has been won by Brown.

The Harvard men's and women's tra c k teams would like to see both of those streaks come to an end at the 2001 Outdoor Heps at Princeton this weekend.

Harvard Women

Co-captain Brenda Taylor's twin sister Lindsay is a captain of the Brown women's track team. Between Indoor and Outdoor Heps, Brown has won six of the last seven championships. Harvard has not won an outdoor title since 1990.

Tomorrow is the last chance for the Harvard seniors to beat Brown in the outdoor season.

At Indoor Heps, Brown edged out Harvard 120 to 110 for the title. That 10-point deficit is equivalent to the point value of a first-place finish.

Co-captains Taylor and Marna Schutte are expected to lead the Harvard scoring on the track.

Taylor, as usual, will run several events for the Crimson. She is the defending champion in the 100-meter dash and the 100-meter high hurdles, and she ran the fastest American time in the country last week at the Penn Relays in the 400-meter intermediate hurdles at 56.11 seconds. Sophomore Amanda Shanklin also has the potential to place highly in the 400 hurdles.

Schutte is the three-time defending meet champion the 400-meter dash, and she has also placed highly in the 200-meter dash at past Heps.

Harvard's 4x400 relay team of Taylor, Schutte, Shanklin, and sophomore Ashley Furst, which placed first against a field of Heptagonal rivals at the Penn Relays, hopes for more of the same success at Heps. The same goes for the 4x100 Harvard relay team, which broke the school record while winning at Outdoor Heps last year.

In the jumps, no one in the Ivies is close to Harvard. Senior Dora Gyorffy is the nation's best in the high jump, and sophomore Kart Siilats was this year's NCAA Indoor champion. Brown's Lindsay Taylor has made strides in the high jump as of late and could contend for second.

Gyorffy is also the two-time defending meet champion in the triple jump. Sophomore Helena Ronner is capable of placing highly in the triple jump, and also has the potential to take the long jump title.

The biggest difference between last year's women's team, which placed third at Outdoor Heps behind Brown and Dartmouth, and this year's team is in the throws. Last year's team scored just five points in the throws. This years throwers expect many more.

The throwers are led by junior Nicky Grant, who has improved rapidly this season. She is in contention to win the hammer throw, and should place highly in the shot put as well.

Among the freshman, Breeanna Gibson is in contention to place in the shot put and the discus. Johanna Doyle has been improving throughout the season in the hammer, and Alexandra Petrone has been leading the team in the javelin.

Harvard Men

The Crimson men will be hard-pressed to stay close with the Tigers on their home turf, but Harvard did have a strong showing at Indoor Heps this year, placing fourth—just nine-points back of second-place Penn. Last year's eighth-place finish at Outdoor Heps was an aberration.

The men's team is led by its throwers, co-captains Chris Clever and John Kraay.

Clever is ranked fourth in the nation in the javelin based on his 73.78-meter throw at the Penn Relays.

Kraay will look to improve upon his second-place finish in the shot put last year, and he and sophomore Ian Shelswell are at the top of the league in the discus.

On the track, freshman Alasdair McLean-Foreman was the brightest spot of Indoor Heps for the Crimson, winning the 800-meter run. He will look for a repeat performance. Sophomores Chris Antunes and John Traugott have both stepped up their performances in recent weeks.

Junior Kobie Fuller in the 400-meter dash, and senior Chuck Nwokocha and sophomore Sean Meeker in the 100-meter dash, are among Harvard's best bets for points in the sprints.

Senior Ed Baker, a consistent scorer for Harvard in the distances, will look to close out strong in his final Heptagonal meet.