Chippewas qualify six for Mid-American Conference indoor track and field championship meet
Six members of the indoor track and field team qualified for the Mid-American Conference indoor championships against tough competition at the Gladstein Invitational this weekend.
Central Michigan brought nine distance runners to the two-day meet, stretching from Friday through Saturday.
“I was really happy with the performance Friday night,” said distance coach Matt Kaczor. “Now that we’ve got these automatic qualifiers, we can start working on other things throughout the season.”
In the men’s 5K, sophomore Nate Ghena and redshirt freshman Spencer Nousain notched the top two places, qualifying at 14:47.12 and 14:47.54, respectively.
“We were just focusing on qualifying for the MAC meet,” Ghena said. “Going into the season, I knew I had to qualify for the 5K and the 3K, and now once I’m at the (MAC) meet, I’ll really be able to worry about getting a fast time.”
Junior Breanne Lesnar, another automatic qualifier, led the CMU women in the 5,000 meter. Lesnar recorded a personal best time of 17:02.58 and earned third place overall.
“This is a huge (personal record),” Lesnar said. “I’m definitely pumped for the MAC meet. I’m hoping to continue improving until then.”
Qualifying immediately behind Lesnar was senior Krista Parks and junior Abbey Kelto. Parks ran a 17:23.96 and Kelto finished in 17:30.69, The upperclassman finished in sixth and seventh, respectively.
Battling through a nagging illness, junior Ethan Lievense qualified in the men’s 3,000-meter dash. Lievense’s time of 8:27.36 earned him a sixth-place finish.
“I came down with the flu and felt like garbage. It hurt going into the race; I didn’t know what to expect,” Lievense said. “I knew that I had to get (this qualification) out of the way to end up getting the job done.”
To get the automatic qualifier for the women’s 3000-meter, the competitors had to run their race in under 9:57.
“I think as a distance team, we will do very well at the MAC meet,” Ghena said.
Kaczor said the Chippewa gained an important sense of confidence with their success this weekend
“It was a pretty good confidence booster for them,” Kaczor said. “Now we just have to keep our nose to the grindstone and good things will happen.”
The CMU long distance runners will join the rest of the team Feb. 1 for the Compass Cup, a tri-meet featuring Eastern Michigan University and Buffalo.
The MAC indoor championships will be held Feb. 28 through March 1 in Kent, Ohio.
