LEXINGTON, Ky. – Freshman Alex Gochenour kicked off the 2012 SEC Indoor Track & Field Championships by setting three event personal records while scoring a personal best 3,855 points en route to a sixth-place finish in the women’s pentathlon during Friday’s competition at the Nutter Field House.
Gochenour put the No. 2-ranked Lady Tigers on the scoreboard with three points in her SEC Indoor debut as her 3,855 points moved her into the No. 8 spot on LSU’s all-time performance list in the event.
Her effort featured a lifetime PR in the shot put, indoor PRs in both the long jump and 800 meters, as well as a mark in the high jump that equaled her indoor personal best set earlier this season.
Gochenour actually raised her pentathlon PR by 176 points as she made her collegiate debut with a 3,679-point performance in a sixth-place finish at the Razorback Invitational back on Jan. 27.
“I was hoping to maybe finish a little higher than that at the beginning of the season, but I’ve come a long way since my first pentathlon,” Gochenour said. “I’m happy with how I was able to finish. I was able to be really consistent with my best marks this season. I had a PR, tied a PR or was right there. It was nice to be consistent today and to score some points for the team that we had to have.”
Gochenour opened the competition by scoring 963 points in the 60-meter hurdles while running the ninth-fastest time of the day at 8.75 seconds. She came up just short of her personal best of 8.71 that was set last weekend in a fifth-place finish at the LSU Twilight held at the Carl Maddox Field House.
Next up for Gochenour was the high jump, where she added 747 points to her total by equaling her indoor PR with a first-attempt clearance at 5 feet, 3 ¼ inches to move up two spots into seventh place.
She then reeled off three personal bests in a row with a lifetime PR of 37-11 ½ on her first toss in the shot put for 633 points, an indoor PR of 18-1 ¾ in the third round of jumps in the long jump for 709 points and an indoor PR of 2 minutes, 21.53 seconds for 803 points in the 800-meter run.
When the dust settled, Gochenour emerged with the nation’s No. 4-ranked pentathlon performance for the 2012 season by a freshman with a total of 3,855 points through five events.
Arkansas junior Makeba Alcide captured the SEC Indoor title in Friday’s pentathlon with a winning score of 4,126 points, while Mississippi State freshman Erica Bougard finished runner-up with 4,109 points.
A product of Missouri Valley, Iowa, Gochenour signed with the Lady Tigers as one of the top multi-event recruits in the United States for the Class of 2011 as the 2010 U.S. Junior champion in the heptathlon with a personal-best score of 5,300 points in the event in winning the national title.
“I’m really looking forward to outdoor and the heptathlon where I’ll be able to do a little bit better,” Gochenour said. “The pentathlon is more difficult because you have to do all of the events in one day, but the main thing for me is that my stronger events are the javelin and the 200 meters. It is a struggle indoors sometimes because I have to make up points in areas where I’m not the strongest right now.”
The action continues at the 2012 SEC Indoor Track & Field Championship on Saturday morning with the field events at 10 a.m. CT followed by the first preliminary races on the track at 1:10 p.m.
Live results of this year’s SEC Indoor meet can be found online at the official website of LSU athletics at www.LSUsports.net. Fans can also watch the Tigers and Lady Tigers in action as ESPN3.com will stream live video of the meet on Saturday from 1:05-6:30 p.m. and Sunday from 12:25-4 p.m.
Live updates throughout the meet will also be available on the official Facebook and Twitter pages for the LSU Track & Field program. To receive these live updates, fans are invited to like LSU Track & Field on Facebook and follow @LSUTrackField on Twitter. Additional coverage for the LSU Track & Field teams on Twitter will be provided by @WillStaffordLSU by sports information director Will Stafford.