This weekend, members of the men’s track and field team will be banking on speed.
The Bulldogs will travel to Boston for two meets that promise to be competitive. The first is the Adidas Boston Indoor Games hosted by Northeastern University at the Reggie Lewis Center on Friday. The second is the Terrier Classic Invitational hosted by Boston University on its home track and will not feature a team score. Since both of these tracks are banked, the runners plan to record some fast times in their races. Like last weekend, neither meet feature attendance by the entire team. Most athletes will compete on Friday or Saturday, but some like Robert DeLaski ’06 will compete in both.
“Both meets are going to feature very good competition,” DeLaski said. “There will definitely be plenty of guys to run with, so I plan on getting out fast.”
DeLaski, who won the 400-meter dash at University of Rhode Island Invitational, will run in the 500-meter dash on Friday and the 400-meter dash and 4×400-meter relay on Saturday. DeLaski said he thinks competing two days in a row will be a good test for him and for others doing the same.
“Since Heps is a two day meet, this will be a good trial for us to see how we handle it,” DeLaski said.
Russell Kempf ’07 is another runner who will be at both meets. On Friday, Kempf will run the 55-meter dash, an event he won Jan. 18 at home against Columbia and Dartmouth. At BU, he will be in the 200-meter dash and join DeLaski for the 4×400-meter relay. Kempf said he was frustrated by his performance last weekend but is glad for the opportunity to redeem himself.
“I am hoping for major improvement on these fast tracks,” Kempf said. “The 4×4 [relay team] is hoping to qualify for IC4As so we have to work hard.”
Unlike the Eli sprinters, none in the distance corps will compete twice this weekend. Since the meets will not feature all of the Bulldogs, many athletes, like Luke Meyer ’05, are focusing on individual successes. Meyer will be running the 5000-meter race on Saturday.
“I want to win the race,” Meyer said. “I am going to focus on winning instead of a fast time, but 14:10 would be a desirable for me.”
Captain Robert Lobue ’04 will also be competing on Saturday. Lobue will run the 800-meter against professional runners from Nike and Reebok as well as other collegiate athletes.
“There will be rabbits taking the race out too fast, so I just want to stay in the middle and see what happens in the last 200 meters,” Lobue said. “I can adapt to the race well, and I have the strength to go out quick if I need to.”
On the field side of events, most of the throwers, jumpers and vaulters will be competing on Friday.
Jordan Chapman ’05, a two-event competitor, said he will be focusing on the pole vault.
“It should be very competitive since Northeastern always has strong field events,” Chapman said. “The pole vault runway at Northeastern is better than ours at Yale. We should be able to run faster than we’ve been running, and hopefullyÊthat extra speed will translate into higher heights this weekend.”
Jihad Beauchman ’06, the best Bulldog triple jumper, will also be competing Friday. Beauchman has placed in the top four in the past two meets.
“Jihad is coming along nicely,” Lobue said. “He has triple jumped very well, and we are looking for good things from him this weekend.”
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