Chippewas use indoor finish as motivation for outdoor season

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Junior sprinter Dierra Riley and the rest of the Central Michigan women’s track and field team are looking to improve on their seventh place finish and meet their goal of becoming Mid-American Conference champions.

The outdoor season will provide opportunities for the women to gain more points and reach full strength in their other events.

“We’re going to use the indoor (MAC) championships as motivation,” Riley said.

A new season holds a lot of changes in events for the Chippewas. The 60-meter dash and hurdles will be pushed back to 100-meters, the mile run will be replaced by the 10,000-meter run, the weight toss is switched to the discus and the pentathlon is replaced by a heptathlon. Other additions include the 400-meter hurdles, the steeplechase, 4×100-meter relay and javelin.

“In the outdoors, we add events like the 4×100-meter relay, where our women finished second in the conference last season, so we are solid there,” said track and field director Willie Randolph.

Along with Riley, seniors Brittnee Shreve, Jordan Dunn and Shanaye Carr make up the relay team, all returning from the 2010 season.

“We have some really talented freshmen who were specifically recruited for those new events,” Randolph said. “We have a lot of events that will make us stronger as a team, but that doesn’t make us different from any other team, unless were not focused to get things done.”

Randolph continues to preach focus to his team like he did during the indoor season, and again its goals remain the same: To win the MAC and get their athletes to NCAA championships.

“Our goals are always to win a MAC championship, get as many athletes to compete in regionals and nationals as possible and that every athlete experiences a great deal of positive collegiate,” Randolph said. “Our expectations are still very high.”

Randolph said the outdoor season is preferable for track and field, as it is much easier to run outside than it is inside, but it comes with one big disadvantage — the uncontrollable weather. Being in Michigan, he said you never know when you’ll be training inside or outside.

“The weather is going to be hot some days, cold and rainy on other days and, in Michigan, you’re going to get what you’re going to get and we need to be prepared,” he said. “We have a schedule that allows us to see nice weather and then we will come back for our home meet in May.”

CMU starts its season next weekend at Vanderbilt in Nashville, Tenn., and one key athlete the women will be missing is distance runner Raeanne Lohner, the CMU record holder in the 10,000-meter.

“Raeanne is adjusting well right now,” Randolph said. “She has been doing really well with her rehab. She isn’t where she wants to be running, but she’s going in the right direction.”

While Lohner is out, the women can make up points with a solid group of distance runners, including seniors Danielle Dakroub and Brittany Dixon, junior Holly Anderson and sophomore Maddie Ribant.

The women finished fourth last year in the outdoor season and hope to make a strong run for first place place in the conference, which would be their first outdoor title since 2004.