BATON ROUGE – The LSU track and field teams made their season debut in the 4×100-meter relay during Friday’s action at the LSU Tiger Relays, and the Tigers and Lady Tigers were impressive in their opening race of the campaign to highlight the first day of competition at the Bernie Moore Track Stadium.
The Lady Tigers lined up in the first event on the track and raced to the finish line in 43.68 seconds as the foursome of senior Samantha Henry, freshman Kimberlyn Duncan, freshman Takeia Pinckney and junior Kenyanna Wilson has already established itself among the nation’s premier relay teams.
LSU’s time of 43.68 is the No. 1-ranked performance in the NCAA in the early part of the outdoor season and is an improvement from its season-opening time of 43.84 in 2009.
The Tigers followed with an impressive run of their own as the team of sophomore Barrett Nugent, senior Will Coppage, junior Gabriel Mvumvure and freshman Johnathan Johnson successfully carried the stick around the oval with the nation’s second-fastest time at 39.97 to qualify for Saturday’s final.
The action at this year’s LSU Tiger Relays continues Saturday with the field events at 9 a.m. CT followed by the first events on the track with the finals of the 4×100-meter relays at 1 p.m.
“This meet is always an important meet for us as many of our kids open up for the first time outdoors in a lot of the events,” said LSU head coach Dennis Shaver. “I was very pleased with the performance of both sprint relays and just the overall competitive spirit I saw from both of our teams today. That’s tremendous for us this early. I can already see how our kids are building on our success from the indoor season.”
The Tigers and Lady Tigers want to be ranked among the top 48 performers in their respective events at the end of the regular season to earn an invitation to compete in the preliminary rounds of the 2010 NCAA Division I Outdoor Track & Field Championships to be held at the East site at Irwin Belk Track in Greensboro, N.C., from May 27-29. This marks the first year of the newly adopted format by the NCAA.
The NCAA has eliminated the regional format used for qualifying for the NCAA Outdoor Championships since the 2003 season in favor of a new format to determine this year’s national champions.
The top 48 performers in each individual event and the top 24 relay teams that declare for the post season in both the East and West regions will compete in the NCAA preliminary rounds. Irwin Belk Track on the campus of North Carolina A&T University in Greensboro will serve as the East site, while Mike A Myers Stadium on the campus of the University of Texas in Austin will serve as the West site.
In all, 96 individuals and 48 relay teams nationwide will compete in the preliminary rounds of the NCAA Outdoor Championships scheduled to run from May 27-29.
Hayward Field at the University of Oregon in Eugene will play host to the final round of the 2010 NCAA Division I Outdoor Track & Field Championships from June 9-12.
Along with their performance on the Lady Tigers’ sprint relay team, both Henry and Pinckney are now in position to qualify for the postseason in the 100-meter dash after running the No. 1 and No. 2 times in the NCAA this season during Friday’s preliminary rounds.
Henry led the way with an impressive wind-legal time of 11.40 to qualify for Saturday’s final in the event and Pinckney followed with a new wind-legal personal best of 11.50 to lead the Lady Tigers. Five other Lady Tigers earned one of nine spots in the 100-meter final scheduled to run Saturday at 4:01 p.m., which includes Wilson (11.56) and senior Kristina Davis (11.59).
Junior All-American Brittani Carter set the pace for the Lady Tigers in the field events with a clearance of 5-11 ¼ to win the high jump crown at this year’s LSU Tiger Relays. After earning All-America accolades with a fifth-place finish at the NCAA Indoor meet two weeks ago, Carter kicked off the outdoor campaign with the No. 2 performance in the country among marks entering the Friday’s competition.
Also winning event titles for the Lady Tigers during the day’s events were junior Melissa Ogbourne in the long jump (19-10 ¼) and sophomore Jenna Henssler in the 5,000 meters (17:59.19).
Fellow junior Melissa Ogbourne also won an event title for the Lady Tigers during the day’s events as she recorded a season-opening wind-legal mark of 19-10 ¼ to win the long jump crown.
After running the leadoff leg on the Tigers’ 4×100 relay earlier in the day, Nugent returned to the track for the preliminary round of the men’s 110-meter hurdles and cruised to the finish line with the fastest time of the day and the No. 2 time in the NCAA at 13.78 in his season debut to qualify for Saturday’s final.
The LSU jumpers picked up right where they left off in the indoor season as junior Zedric Thomas and freshman Damar Forbes tied one another for second place in the men’s long jump with matching marks of 25-2. Thomas set a new outdoor personal record with his performance, while Forbes established a lifetime PR with his best career mark for both the indoor and outdoor seasons.
Sophomore Richard Chautin wrapped up the evening for the Tigers by capturing the 5,000 meters with an overall personal-best time of 14:49.90 in the final event.
And as the name might suggest, the relay events highlighted Friday’s action at the LSU Tiger Relays with both the Tigers and Lady Tigers sweeping titles in the 1,600-meter sprint medley relay. The men recorded a winning time of 3 minutes, 20.70 seconds with Robert Simmons (200), Armanti Hayes (200), Ade Alleyne-Forte (400) and Jamaal James (800). The women clocked 3:52.02 while running with a foursome of Davis (200), Cassandra Tate (200), LaTavia Thomas (400) and Kayann Thompson (800).
After wrapping up the LSU Tiger Relays on Saturday afternoon, the teams will make the trip to Austin, Texas, next weekend to compete in the 83rd Clyde Littlefield Texas Relays slated to begin on Thursday at Mike A. Myers Stadium on the campus of the University of Texas.