April 30, 2006

NAIA runners competed with the country's top athletes at national meets throughout the states.  NAIA Track & Field was represented at the Kansas Relays, Drake Relays and the Penn Relays during the last two weeks.

Kansas Relays

Lindenwood University (Mo.) stole two events at the 2006 Kansas Relays.  Junior Mike Rodgers continued his sprint dominance with a victory in the 100-meter dash with a time of 10.29, nearly two tenths faster than his nearest opponent. Freshman Aron Rono won the college 5000-meter run on in a time of 14:22.06, improving his NAIA national automatic qualifying time. Rono bested his school record time in the mile run with a time of 4:03.64, earning second place.

Senior Graham Danziger placed fourth in the pole vault (16-0.75) and sophomore Joe Fuchs placed second in the 10,000-meter run (31:31.46). Junior Dan Miner was second in the 3,000-meter steeplechase (9:26.93) and the men's 4x100-meter relay team of Rascive Grant, John Ingraham, Jody Sneed, and Rodgers placed second, running it in 40.44.

Drake Relays
Lindenwood's Rono won the 10,000-meter run in record time, 29:37.36, setting a new school record and posting the fastest Drake Relays winning time since 1992.

Rono broke the school record, the oldest still standing, of 29:48.12 by Tim Wunsch set in 1991.

Rodgers placed second in the 100-meter dash on Saturday. A Berkely High School graduate, Rodgers ran a time of 10.64 seconds into a 1.1 mile per hour headwind. He placed second behind Wisconsin junior Demi Omole. Rodgers beat a field stacked with some of the fastest sprinters in the NCAA.

The men's 4x100, anchored by Rodgers, placed third in the college division with a time of 40.57.

Junior James Jenkins, a McCluer North High School graduate, placed third in the triple jump with a mark of 49-10. Freshman Carlos Mattis was tenth with a mark of 47-0.75.

Penn Relays
Virginia Intermont College senior Corey Duquette defended his Penn Relays College Championship 10,000-meter title, but had to out-kick teammate David Cheromei for the win. Duquette pulled even with Cheromei with a lap to go after Cheromei had pulled away mid-race with fellow countryman Linus Maiyo of Nike, the winner of the Olympic Development section of the 10k. Duquette managed a personal best of 29:05.07 to Cheromei's 29:17.89.

Duquette gave coach Scott Simmons his fifth Penn Relays title in as many years, unparalleled by any collegiate coach. The other Penn champion's of Simmons include Brad and Mike Tighe (2002 championship and college 5,000-meters, respectively) and Nolan Taylor (2003 college steeplechase).

Seniors Danny Reid, Kevin Lindsey, Tim Ramirez and sophomore Caleb Lynch became the first-ever Azusa Pacific University (Calif.) athletes to compete in the prestigious Penn Relays.  The quartet not only brought the Azusa Pacific name onto a most significant stage, the men also set a school record. The quartet finished in third place in the 4x800-meter relay by clocking a time of 7:23.85. They finished behind Oral Roberts University (7:18.74) and Villanova University (7:19.06) and broke the former school standard by nearly 3 seconds.