The Rice women’s track and field team delivered strong performances during the three-day 44 Farms Team Invitational at Texas A&M, according to an April 12 announcement.
The meet saw several athletes achieve personal bests and high placements in their events. Alice Taylor broke her previous heptathlon record by scoring 5605 points, improving by nearly 500 points from her earlier mark. Julia Johannesdottir also set a new personal best with 5536 points, securing second and fourth place finishes for the pair in the heptathlon.
In the javelin event, Mckyla Van der Westhuizen claimed first place with a throw of nearly 57 meters. Teammates Emily Harbach and Elena Schwegman finished fourth and seventh respectively. Sydney Rothman achieved a personal-best clearance of 3.82 meters in pole vault to finish third, while Lauren Schmitt and Sima Ashkinezer also recorded their own top marks.
Sutton Walsh posted a significant improvement in the 5000-meter run with a time of 18:17.37, finishing fifth after cutting over twenty seconds from her previous best. Miranda Schriver took second place in the 1500 meters, followed by Brooklyn Crow in eighth.
Head Coach Jim Bevan said, “There was so much to be happy with this weekend. First, the heptathlon was incredible. Alice had a 500-point improvement, potentially doing enough to clinch a ticket to Eugene in June, and Julia had a personal best, probably sitting around the bubble to get in. It was so impressive to see what those two accomplished. We continue with the javelin, Mckyla with a great throw to win, Emily and Elena also looked good today… I was really impressed with how we looked today and look forward to seeing us continue to get better.”
Looking ahead, Rice will split its squad among three upcoming meets at UH (University of Houston), Long Beach State University, and Bryan Clay Invitational.
