May 13, 2000

Box Score

Billed as one of the nation's fastest men's miles and women's 5K's of the year, the Oregon Twilight lived up to its reputation with a slew of Olympic, Olympic Trials and NCAA qualifiers Saturday evening.

In the Bill McChesney Jr. Memorial Twilight Mile, post-collegian Jason Pyrah unleashed a punishing final 300 meter kick to win the race over South Africa's Clyde Colenso (second, 3:59.49) and Oregon senior Steve Fein (third, 3:59.35).

For Fein it was the first sub-4:00 mile of his career and now ranks him 21st among the 27 distance runners on Oregon's all-time list, not to mention the fastest by a Duck since the 1980's. For NCAA qualifying purposes, Fein's time just missed the NCAA automatic mark of 3:59.20 and virtually guarantees him a spot in the collegiate metric equivalent (the 1,500), although he'll likely take a shot at a NCAA 5K qualifying mark next week in the Pac-10 Championships for his third NCAA trip in the 12 « lap event.

On the women's side, Asics runner and Eugenean Marla Runyan led most of the race en route to a time of 15:07.66 for the second-fastest time in the world so far this season. Runyan's time erased the meet record of 15:17.72 set by Annette Peters in 1991 and just missed the track record of 15:06.53 held by Mary Slaney. Nike's Elva Dryer (second, 15:09.19), adidas's Cheri Kenah (third, 15:10.50) and Reebok's Amy Rudolph (fourth, 15:14.64) were close behind for marks that were top 10 in the world so far this year.

For the Duck women's squad, a host of season and personal bests came around the track.

In the throws, the Ducks added two Pac-10 qualifiers in the hammer thanks to freshmen Mary Etter (second, 163-8) and Jordan McDaniels (third, 160-), while junior Maureen Morrison won the event with her fifth +180-foot mark since April (184-8). Etter also won the discus (158-10) and shot put (42- 6 1/4) later in the afternoon.

In the jumps, Hilary Holly was within two inches of her long jump season best with Saturday's winning mark (19-0 3/4), while freshman Amanda Brown edged closer to the Pac-10 mark (second, 18-10 1/2) and fell two inches shy of the standard. Also notching a personal best on the runway Saturday, senior Farrah McCubbin won the triple jump (36-7 1/2) after opening the evening with a personal best and win in the 400 hurdles (1:04.20).

Freshman Lucretia Larkin paced the team in the sprints with her fourth sub-14.50 mark the past three weeks in the 100 hurdles (14.25), while sophomore Shennae McNairy (second, 14.39) was only .05 seconds off her first Pac-10 invite with Saturday's personal best. The Ducks also won the 100 and 400 courtesy of freshman Heather Murtaugh (12.41) and sophomore Endia Abrante (55.91).

The UO men also made noise on the national list thanks to sophomore Jason Boness who improved his season best to 7-3 1/4 with his win Saturday in the high jump. In the throws, sophomore John Bello raised his personal best in the shot put to 57-5 3/4 a 4 3/4-inch outdoor best and 3/4 improvement on his indoor best of 57-5 from February. Sophomore James March took second (52-10 1/4), missing a personal best by less than two inches and the Pac-10 mark by only 2 1/2 inches.

Also of note Saturday, sophomore Cody Howell quietly continued one of team's most dramatic improvements this season. The Veneta, Ore., Native and Elmira High School product raised his personal best another four inches Saturday to 17-0 3/4 only an inch shy of the NCAA provisional mark. Howell entered the outdoor season with a previous best of 16-0 3/4 from 1998.

A quartet of Duck multi-eventers return to action Sunday for final day action in the heptathlon and decathlon. Sophomores Jenny Kenyon and Santiago Lorenzo lead Duck entries with third-place standings at the halfway points of the heptathlon and decathlon, respectively. Action begins Sunday at the University of Oregon's Hayward Field at 12:15 p.m. and wraps up at 4:30 p.m. Admission is free.

Looking ahead to next week, the Duck men and women return to Hayward Field for one more meet next weekend, hosting the Pac-10 Championships for the first time since 1982. Tickets are still available by calling the Duck ticket office at 541/346-4461 or 1-800-WEB-FOOT.

--UO--