GENEVA, Ohio --- The Biola men's distance medley relay broke the school record while the women's DMR and 4x800 teams ran the fastest times in qualifying to highlight action at the first day of the 2013 NAIA Indoor Track and Field National Championships at the SPIRE Institute in Geneva, Ohio on Thursday.
The men's DMR team of Andrew Daedler, James McCahon, Shane Brinson and Danny Ledesma put together an impressive race, combining to run a 10:16.1, breaking the old record by a full second. The old mark was set at the NAIA National Championship meet in 2000 at the University of Nebraska.
On the women's side, a pair of relays qualified for the finals: the 4x800 and the distance medley relay. The DMR team raced to a virtual tie for the fastest time in the prelims with a time of 12.04.06. The team of Ilima Kung, Tayllor Lemphers, Anika Gasner and Kellian Hunt, finished with the same official time as College of Idaho, but was one-thousandth of a second slower when it broke down that far.
This is the sixth-straight year the women's DMR has qualified for the indoor national championships with the Eagles earning All-America honors he last four years.
The 4x800 team has also qualified the last six years and reached the finals with the fastest time in the prelims with a 9:09.54. Hunt, Gasner, Alicia Hoverson and Alexandra Sciarra ran the fastest prelim time by eight seconds.
Junior Lauren Houck had a good day in the women's pentathlon, placing 13th overall with 2,892 points. She earned a PR in the 60 hurdles in 9.43 seconds and also in the high jump, clearing 1.54m (5-00.5 inches).
In the 5,000m run, Carrie Soholt and Neysa Mains each recorded personal bests with times of 18:15.10 and 18:23.03, respectively.
The meet continues on Friday with qualifying opportunities in the following events: Men's Mile (Daedler and Ledesma), Men's 3,000 (Ledesma), Men's 1,000 (Daedler), Women's 600 (Sciarra), Women's 800 (Gasner), Women's 1,000 (Hunt) as well as the finals of the women's 4x800 relay. In field events, the women's pole vault qualifying and finals are contested on Friday with Nicole Falkenstein currently ranked No. 11 entering the championships.
