Posted: Apr 20, 2022
BEREA, KY - The NC Wesleyan College men's and women's track and field teams competed in the first day of the USA South Championships on Wednesday from Berea, Kentucky. The women are sitting in 9th place out of 11 schools after the first day while the men are in 10th place.
Day one started off on a good note as senior long jumper Bijou Patel, who was unranked in the long jump, made the finals and broke the school record with a jump of 4.82 meters. She finished 5th overall out of 22 scoring the first 4 points for her team. Sirleaf also competed in the long jump and finished 10th with a mark of 4.58 meters.
Freshman sprinter Assata Sirleaf set a new school record and personal record of 17.8 seconds in the 100 meter hurdles. Sirleaf heads to the finals in 6th place. Junior distance runner Teanna Bellamy followed up in the 400 meter run by winning her opening round heat and heads to the finals with the second fastest time of the day in 1 minute flat.
Freshman sprinter Mariah Brooks wooed the crowd in the 100 meter dash by breaking the USA South Conference record in first round in the time of 12.17.
Bellamy also made the finals by placing fourth overall with a new personal record of 13.22. The duo of Brooks and Bellamy also move in to the finals in the 200 meter dash. Brooks is heading into the final day of the 200 meter finals with the fastest time (25.66) while Bellamy set a new personal record of 27.3 seconds to place 8th overall.
In the women's field events, freshman Christian Van Norden placed 19th overall out of 34 throwers in the Discus with a mark of 24 meters while she was also 12th out of 30 in the Javelin throw with a mark of 21.9 meters. Teammate Kameesha Pascoe also threw the javelin and placed 22nd with a mark of 16.8 meters.
"I'm extremely proud of how the women's team performed today," commented Coach Dunn. "We had a team meeting last night and they talked about how they felt slighted in the polls and they aimed to prove everybody wrong. All they wanted was respect and I think they earned it today."
"Bijou started the day off and it just kept getting better from there," continued Dunn. "Teanna has been steadily improving and it showed today. She made the finals in 3 events. I look forward to tomorrow in how the rest of the team performs. There is still a lot of events to take place and we are up for the challenge."
On the men's side, senior Keyonte Williams placed 6th overall out of 12 in the pole vault with a personal record of 3 meters. Williams made it back to the finals in the 400 meter hurdles as well with a time of 58.9 seconds as well. He is ranked sixth going into the finals.
In the field events, Jarelle Simmons led the way in the Javelin throw placing 11th out of 25 with a mark of 36.19 meters while Malik Anderson led the way in the Discus throw with a mark of 30.5 meters to place 12th out of 21 athletes.
"Our men's team has been making improvements," commented head Coach Bill Dunn. "Team Captain Keyonte has set the tone for the rest of the meet. Keyonte has led by example the whole season. He will leave it all on the track for us tomorrow."
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