2008 Woodie Awards
McClure registers fastest 5,000-meter time in MAC
Edwards finishes 24th in 400-meter dash in Arkansas
By: Tim Ottusch
Issue date: 2/18/08 Section: Sports
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McClure finished fifth in the 5000-meter run in a time of 17 minutes, 5.23 seconds. Her time was good enough to give her the fastest 5,000-meter time in the Mid-American Conference this season, beating out Miami's Laura Neufarth by more than five seconds.
"It was just kind of one of those races where everything came together, which is what we want," said coach Karen Lutzke. "It was a really good race."
McClure was just under four seconds off of breaking Chris Cooper's CMU record of 17:01.31 set in 1987. Her 3,000m time of 9:50.77 is fourth in the MAC. She also was the team's top cross country runner at the MAC Championship this fall and won the Central Collegiates.
Accompanying McClure to the meet was senior sprinter Jenaie Edwards, who competed in the 400m dash. Edwards finished 24th in 54.58 seconds.
"Jenaie's 400 was a solid race," Lutzke said. "There's some things that she can do better and that's good because it wasn't a perfect race and yet she still ran fast."
Her time was .11 seconds faster than her time at that same point last year when she won the 400 Indoor MAC Championship.
Lutzke said Edwards was able to run faster despite not running a perfect race.
"She got a little bit slower and she got stuck behind people after the 200 mark and had to make up some ground," she said. "When you have a perfect race there's not that much you can do. When it's not perfect and you still run fast you know that you're ready to drop time and I think by the MAC meet she's going to be able to be ahead of where she was last year."
Edwards 400 time at the meet is the second fastest in the MAC this season. She sits just .09 seconds behind Western Michigan's Becky Horn, last year's runner-up in both the 400 indoor and outdoor MAC Championships. The senior finished 22nd in the event in a time of 54.49. The two will compete in two weeks during the MAC Championships.
"Her and Becky battle back and forth between each other and the MAC meet's going to be a great competition," Lutzke said.
Horn and Edwards both have been two of the MAC's top performers this season. Horn and Edwards are one-two in the 800, Horn is first with a time of 2:09.15 and Edwards is second in 2:10.46.
In the 200, Edwards is fifth (25.04) and Horn is seventh (25.08). They are both anchors on their 4-by-400 relay teams, WMU is first (3:38.16) and CMU is second (3:51.73).
"She's been my rival as far back as I can remember," Edwards said. "It's a good rivalry. We're actually pretty good friends, we talk at every track meet."
Lutzke said the two are such good rivals because of their versatility.
"Becky's the same type of athlete as Jenaie is where they have a range where they can run 200 to 800," Lutzke said. "They're very competitive in all those events."
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