June 16, 2004

Back to the table of Contents Page

Classifieds

Palo Alto Online

Stanford has solid efforts

by Keith Peters

The NCAA Track and Field Championships is no ordinary animal. Don't be confused by the times and marks. The only thing that matters is place.

That's why they give out team trophies for the high-point winners and medals to the top eight individuals.

Too many other variables come into play in a national finals - like unpredictable weather.

At the 2004 NCAA championships last week in Austin, Texas, for example, pouring rain, freezing hail and bolts of lightning caused the stands to be evacuated on the opening day and forced the schedule to be changed.

Once the inclement weather retreated it was, well, still nasty.

"The heat and humidity was definitely a factor," said Robert Weir, Stanford's head men's coach. "I never expected Austin, Texas to be so hot and humid. The people who were really prepared to handle that performed better."

The Stanford women did finish sixth overall with 27 points, the team's highest finish since taking fourth in 1992 - also in Austin. Arkansas won the men's competition with 65 1/2 points while Stanford finished 17th with 17 points.

Sophomore Alicia Craig was the Cardinal's only individual champion, repeating in the women's 10,000 meters.

Craig had two very important tests last Thursday. The first was a three-hour final in Human Behavioral Biology at a team hotel in Austin, Texas. The second test came hours later and was considerably shorter - it took only 33 minutes, 58.27 seconds. While Craig will have to wait to discover her grade in her first test, she definitely passed the second and the reward was better than an A-plus.

For Craig, her time of 33:58.27 set a stadium record and earned her a second straight national title in the women's 10,000 in Myers Stadium on the campus of the University of Texas.

Craig became the first Stanford athlete to win the women's 10,000 title two years in a row and the only the second Pac-10 runner in history to accomplish that feat. Amy Skieresz of Arizona was the first, winning titles in 1997 and 1998.

"I didn't want to be overly confident," said Craig, who entered the competition with a collegiate record time of 32:19.97. "I wanted to be nice and relaxed during the race, and then get excited over the last mile."

Craig did just that as she and three other runners led the pack for most of the race, until the last 3 1/2 laps when Craig moved away from the other three runners to take a commanding lead. Craig passed through 9,000 meters at 30:45.06 and cruised a 3:12.7 over the final 1,000 meters to claim the win.

"It's a two-mile run, a two-mile practice and a two-mile race," Craig said of her plan. "That's definitely my approach. I just wanted to take people off guard and put in a surge that was hard to cover."

Craig's next race will be at the U.S. Olympic Trials that begin July 9 at Sacramento State.

Stanford junior Sara Bei and senior Jill Camarena earned second-place finishes in their respective events on the final day to help the Cardinal women.

Bei finished second in the 5,000, her best NCAA finish ever, to gain her fourth All-American honor as a Cardinal with a time of 16:24.00. Kim Smith of Providence took a commanding lead during the first lap and never looked back in chalking up a time of 15:48.86. After Smith crossed the finish line, Bei and Notre Dame's Molly Huddle got into a battle for the runnerup position. Bei passed Huddle with 60 meters left and took second.

"This is what I kind of expected," said Bei. "for Kim to run that far ahead. Kim is a great runner; an Olympic-caliber runner."

Camarena didn't mince words shortly after the competition ended in the shot put.

"I'm pretty disappointed," she said. "I knew everyone was going to step it up in the final throws, and I needed to step it up. Maybe I tried too hard."

Camarena finished second with a throw of 59-5. Laura Gerraughty of North Carolina, the pre-meet favorite, fouled on two of her first four attempts before capturing the title with a throw of 59-11 on her fifth attempt.

Gerraughty fouled on her sixth and final attempt to give Camarena a chance to win the competition on her final throw. But it was not meant to be as Camarena managed just 57-7.

Camarena, nevertheless, ended her collegiate career with seven All-American honors. Earlier this season, she established a school record in the with a throw of 59-6 1/4 - second best in Pac-10 history.

Donald Sage, the 1992 NCAA 1,500 meter champion, finished third in 3:45.03. Chris Mulvaney of Arkansas won the title at 3:44.72 followed by BYU's Nathan Robison at 3:44.94. For Sage, a junior, it was his 10th All-American honor.

"I tried to kick it out with 400 meters to go," said Sage, "but I didn't quite have it. I never got the break where I thought I had a chance (to win). I'm actually in better shape than I was when I won two years ago, but today was not my day."

Ian Dobson captured All-American honors for an eighth time in his Cardinal career with a third-place effort in the 3,000 steeplechase of 8:48.12. Dobson led at the end of the sixth lap after picking up the pace with a lap of 73.5, but race winner Jordan Desilets of Eastern Michigan quickly moved to the front and never trailed again. Desilets turned in a last lap of 67.9 to win easily in 8:42.64. Dobson went into the race with the nation's leading time of 8:32.09.

In the men's 5,000, Louis Luchini ended his four-year Stanford career with a fourth place finish to earn All-America honors for an eleventh-time time. Luchini was among three Stanford runners in the race and he was timed in 14:16.44. Arizona's Robert Chesret, who fell down the race, recovered to win in a time of 13:49.85.

During the four days of competition, Stanford produced one NCAA champion and 10 All-Americans.

UCLA won the women's title with 69 points, one better than LSU. The Bruins' Jackie Nguyen, a Castilleja grad and Atherton resident, scored four very big points with a fifth-place finish in the pole vault. She cleared a personal best of 13-5 1/4 on her first try and earned All-American honors.

E-mail a friend a link to this story.