BATON ROUGE — The No. 1 ranked LSU men’s track and field team and the sixth-ranked Lady Tigers head to Austin, Texas for the second time in three weeks this weekend, as both squads will participate in the 2001 Longhorn Invitational Championships at Mike A. Myers Stadium on Friday and Saturday.
The meet will consist of five teams on both the men’s and women’s side. Seven of the 10 teams involved this weekend are ranked in the top 25.
“This is a very good competitive situation for us,” said LSU head coach Pat Henry. “This is our second to last meet before the SEC Championships and it’s an opportunity to test ourselves in a competitive environment and on a great track.”
The men’s competition includes the top-ranked Tigers, 15th-ranked Texas A&M, 16th-ranked Texas, Minnesota and Washington State. LSU is the highest ranked team in the women’s competition as well, as the sixth-ranked Lady Tigers take on No. 7 Texas, No. 12 Rice, No. 24 Washington State and Texas A&M.
Critical to success for the Tigers this weekend will be several events.
Lueroy Colquhoun, a three-time All-American and member of the Tigers’ world-leading 4×400-meter relay team, has yet to register an NCAA qualifying mark in the 400-meter dash and will attempt to do so this weekend, getting opportunities in the preliminary rounds on Friday and the finals on Saturday.
Among the Tigers’ priorities on the track this weekend will be qualifying the 4×100-meter relay team as well. The Tigers’ foursome of Devery Henderson, Robert Parham, Gerald Green and Dwhyte Barrett is already provisionally qualified in the event and ranks ninth in the nation but will likely need to run faster to gain entry into the NCAA Championships.
“I think we’re ready to run fast with that group, it’s just a matter of the right race, the right track and good exchanges,” added Henry.
In the field, the Tigers will look for improvement from Javier Nieto, a two-time NCAA qualifier in the hammer. Nieto opened with an NCAA provisional throw of 207-2 in LSU’s outdoor opener last month but has yet to improve upon that mark.
On the women’s side, the Lady Tigers will attempt to qualify their 4×400-meter relay squad that has yet to run a qualifier during the outdoor season.
In addition, Henry has indicated he will be slightly more aggressive with doubling people up this weekend with the SEC Championships right around the corner. Muna Lee will run in both the 100 and 200-meter dashes for the first time during the outdoor season to give the freshman a glimpse of what it will take to compete through the rounds of the events at the SEC and NCAA Championships.
“We want to give some of our newcomers a chance to double up this weekend to see what kind of pace and effort it takes to advance through the rounds and into finals,” said Henry. “This is really our last opportunity to give them a feel for that before the conference meet.”
Following the Longhorn Invitational, LSU turns its attention towards the 106th running of the Penn Relays which runs next Thursday through Saturday, the final competition before the SEC Championships from May 10-13.