A strong contigent of Virginia's best is headed up to Franklin Field in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania from Thursday through Saturday to compete at one of the largest and most exciting track events in country at the Penn Relays. We will try to keep you updated on their performances including daily meet summaries of Virginians as well as link to the great coverage expected from the MileSplit US national team, but you can help us out with what's going down at the 119th annual Penn Relays by using hashtag #VAatPennRelays on twitter.
Photo by Steve Lee of https://de.milesplit.com
Thursday Highlights:
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The Northern Region was well represented in the jumps by scoring the two high school event champions in both the girls' long jump and girls' triple jump with top seed Felecia Majors of South County outperforming the rest of the field in the long jump as favored to do, while Thomas Edison senior Anna Williams achieved a new personal best mark of 41'1" to claim the Penn Relays title in the triple jump. Williams now moves into a US #3 national ranking with her leap today at Franklin Field, while Majors achieved a new personal best of 20'3" in the long jump to make her the US #2 performer in the event. (Felecia Majors Video Interview)
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Despite being the defending Penn Relays 3000 meter champion Sophie Chase of Lake Braddock was overlooked by some prior to the meet and others were highlighted as the pre-race favorites. Chase is a highly motivated runner as it is, but any extra fuel she will use as she did in her race on Thursday evening. After starting out conservative for the first 800 meters back in the field, Chase then quickly moved her way up to the front of the field to lead through the mile in 5:10 and never relinquishing the lead in the last half of the race en route to a 9:35.52 victory to repeat as Penn Relays Champion. Oakton sophomore Allie Klimkiewiz finished 7th in 9:48, while Lake Braddock teammate Hannah Christen placed 10th at 9:50. (Sophie Chase Video Interview)
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The Lake Braddock girls 4x800 meter relay team won their heat in a new state leading time of 9:15, which will rank them third fastest heading into tomorow's Championship of America finals behind only Edwin Allen of Jamaica (9:05) and Mamaroneck (9:15) of New Jersey. Lake Braddock's splits went 2:27 for Ally Robinson, 2:16.2 for Sophie Chase, 2:16.6 for Hannah Christen, and 2:15.7 for Katie Roche. All four legs have ran faster individually in the 800, so another time drop is possible for the finals to chase after the Jamaicans and be the top US team in the race.
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Competing in a loaded section with Vere Technical of Jamaica and Long Beach Poly of California, one of Virginia's best 4x400 meter relay teams of all-time in the Woodbridge girls were able to run fast enough in an incredible deep year for the event as their swift time of 3:47.37 remarkably put them dangerously close of missing the Championships of America finals as the 8th fastest overall among all the 4x400 qualifying heats. Woodbridge's time is just a tenth of a second off their season best and school record time of 3:47.27 at the home invitational (Gojekian Twilight Classic) two weeks ago and will have an excellent opportunity tomorrow against some of the best 4x400s in the nation and Caribbean to lower their time.
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The South County girls featuring Felecia Majors were able to make the finals of the large schools 4x100 meter rela with the 8th fastest time in the division as they won their heat in a 47.80 clocking. The current state leaders from King's Fork (47.50 season best) qualified for the finals of the small schools division with a 48.07 performance to claim first place in their heat.
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Caroline Alcorta and the West Springfield girls found themselves right in the mix among the top 5 places throughout the race with a chase pack of teams as the relay from Benjamin Cardozo of New York separated early from the field. West Springfield girls became only the second time indoors in state history to break 12 minutes in the DMR and joined another small class of former great DMRs from Virginia to do the same outdoors with their 5th place showing of 11:59.69.
Photo by Tim Fulton
Girls Highlights
