March 3, 2006
Notre Dame, Ind. – Notre Dame senior Stephanie Madia (Wexford, PA) set a meet and track record in the women’s 5,000 meter run to highlight day one of the Alex Wilson Invitational at the Loftus Center on the campus of the University of Notre Dame.
Madia won the event in a time of 16 minutes, 2.14 seconds, smashing the old meet record of 16:15.06 set by Anne Bersagel of Wake Forest in 2003 and the former track record of 16:08.59 by Molly McLimon of Michigan. The performance automatically qualifies Madia for the NCAA Indoor Championships to be held March 10-11 in Fayetteville, AR.
In the men’s distance medley relay, Notre Dame’s quartet of Thomas Chamney, Ryan Postel, Adam Currie and Kurt Benninger established a provisional qualifying mark of 9:33.82 while placing fourth in the competition. The performance virtually assures the unit of a place in next week’s NCAA meet.
The Alex Wilson Invitational lived up to its reputation of producing outstanding distance medley relay performances as 13 men’s relay teams established NCAA qualifying marks, led by Wisconsin’s automatic qualifying time of 9:32.76.
In individual action, two additional athletes produced automatic NCAA qualifying marks. Ohio State’s Leonard Jatsek won the men’s weight throw with a toss of 22.09 meters (72 feet, 5 ¾ inches) and Charisse Bacchus of Kansas won the women’s long jump with a leap of 6.42 meters (21-0 ¾).
The Alex Wilson Invitational continues Saturday morning at 10:30 with the men’s triple jump. The first running event starts at 11 a.m.