On the road for the first time in the outdoor season Hurricane Track and Field made their way to Gainesville for the Pepsi Florida Relays. Though it wasn’t their most impressive performance of the season there were still some impressive individual performances.
Starting it off Friday, Daphnee Lavassas took home Miami’s one and only first place finish in the 5000m with a time of 16:36.82. This wasn’t the senior’s only big performance as she also took home the second fastest time in school history in the 1500m. At 4:21.45 she slightly outpaced her teammate sophomore Maddie Scheier who took the fourth best spot in the women’s record books at 4:22.55. For the men, senior Josh Jones did the same, taking fourth place in the event and the second spot in Miami’s record books for the 1500m with a time of 3:47.58. Jones would also enter the record books again with a time of 1:49.68 in the 800m putting him in 5th.
It was a strong weekend for the Women’s relay teams as both the 4×100 and 4×400 qualified for the finals. The latter led by junior Gabriella Grissom and freshmen Janay Moorer, Serena Tate and Morgan Roundtree set a season best in the prelim at 3:38.48. In the invite section Grissom would switch over and run with freshmen Iyonna Codd and junior Sanaa Hebron to bring that time down to 3:33.89.
In the 400m hurdles Hebron also took home third place while taking the 4th fastest time in Hurricanes history at 55.87 seconds. Junior George Franks in the regular 400m moved into fourth as well with a 46.15 time.
Rounding out the weekend’s performances junior Desmond Coleman got third place with a mark of 57.77 in the discus. And senior Helga Sigurjonsdottir in the high jump set a new PR in the high jump moving her into third all time at 1.82m.
Miami will be off this next week but will soon return to action when they head out on the road. Their first stop is in California for the Mt.Sac Relays April 16 and 17. The team will then likely split up and either head to Gainesville again for the Tom Jones Memorial or to the Wake Forest Invitational April 18-19.