AMES, Iowa – All-Americans Clayton Young and Erica Birk-Jarvis broke program records as nine BYU track and field athletes moved up the school record boards at the Iowa State Classic and Texas Tech Shootout on Saturday.
“One of the big reasons we come to the Iowa State Classic is because of the quality of competition in the distance field,” BYU head coach Ed Eyestone said. “We had some amazing performances at both of the meets and I’m proud of how our athletes have been competing.”
Iowa State Classic
Birk-Jarvis broke the all-time record at BYU on her way to winning the women’s 3000m invite at the Iowa State Classic on Friday. Her time of 9:00.69 broke the previous record of 9:04.06 set in 2004 by All-American Michaela Mannova.
“Erica was very impressive and put herself in position to likely qualify for the NCAA Championships,” Eyestone said. “She got a little gapped at one point, but she was strong in the final 800 meters to close things out and break the school record.”
Young took first in the men’s 5000m invite at the Iowa State Classic with a time of 13:34.46 to set the new school record. The senior also ran the fastest times in meet and facility history breaking the previous records by almost three seconds. Current teammate, All-American Rory Linkletter set the previous 5000m school record of 13:41.01 at the Iowa State Classic last season.
All-American Connor McMillan and Conner Mantz moved up BYU’s top 10 record boards in the 5000m as well. McMillan clocked 13:38.63 to move up five spots to No. 2 all-time while Mantz finished with a time of 13:39.27 for the third-best time in school history.
“When you have three guys who break the previous school record, you know it has been an outstanding race,” Eyestone said. “I was very proud with how the guys stepped up and we’ll have to see what happens when it comes to qualifying for the NCAA Championships.”
On Saturday, Talem Franco ran the men's mile in 4:01.16 to record the eighth-fastest time in school history. All-American Matt Owens and Patrick Parker also earned personal bests in the mile with times of 4:01.50 and 4:03.14, respectively.
Lauren Ellsworth-Barnes ran the women's 800m in 2:07.14 to tie current teammate All-American Madey Brooks-Dickson for the ninth-best time in program history. This is the second time this season Ellsworth-Barnes has earned a spot in the school records after running on the record-breaking DMR team at the UW Invite.
All-American Whittni Orton won the women’s mile with a time of 4:39.19 and Anna Camp-Bennett took second with a career-best 4:41.01. Kate Hunter (4:47.44) and Sadie Sargent (4:47.48) both earned personal best times in the women’s mile to place 5-6.
Texas Tech Shootout
Michael Bluth ran a career-best 46.94 in the men’s 400m on Friday to earn a spot on the school record boards with the fourth-best time in BYU history. Bluth competed again on Saturday in the 200m earning a personal-best 21.44.
“We knew that it was only a matter of time before we had a performance like this from Michael,” Eyestone said. “He is going to be one of the key components of our men’s DMR relay team that we’ll be running next week at Notre Dame.”
On Saturday, Jaslyn Gardner earned her second spot on BYU’s top 10 boards after clocking 24.45 in the women’s 200m for the ninth-fastest time. The true freshman ran the No. 5 women’s 60m time in her college debut at the BYU Indoor Invite in early January.
Clark Brown ran a career-best 21.20 in the 200m to move up to No. 8 all-time at BYU. Brown had a strong performance in the 60m final on Friday taking fifth place overall with a time of 6.81.
Jefferson Jarvis had his best indoor performance in the men’s shot put with a mark of 18.06m/59-3. Jacob Foutz improved his personal record in the shot put by almost two meters with a toss of 17.06m/55-9.25.
All-American Andrea Stapleton-Johnson took second in the women’s high jump with a height of 1.82m/5-11.5 and Elise Romney cleared 3.97m/13-0.25 to take fifth in the women’s pole vault.
The Cougars will travel next to compete at Notre Dame’s Alex Wilson Invitational on Saturday, Feb. 16, at the Loftus Sports Center. Broadcast information and live stats will be available on the BYU track and field schedule pages two days prior to the meet.
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