Beckford's 4:32.3 Mile Paces Tracksters to 7th at Easterns

When the curtain closed on the women's Eastern Track Championships, and hundreds of the finest women athletes in the East packed up their spikes and loaded buses for home, only three meet records remained intact, and every ITT facility record had fallen.

The University of Maryland capped record setting victories in the high jump and pentathlon with points in almost every event to collect 68 points and its second Eastern title. The Crimson tied for seventh in a field of 65 schools with 22 points, easily beating out Ivy rivals Brown in 16th and Princeton in 20th.

The list of record-breaking performances and impressive victories is long, but heading that roster is Crimson speedster Darlene Beckford.

Beckford stayed on the shoulder of Villanova's Bridig Leddy until the last lap of the mile run, when she burst ahead to win in 4:32.3, a new national collegiate indoor record. Beckford's blistering pace knocked more than 16 seconds off the old Eastern record and more than 12 seconds off the Harvard facility record. Beckford now stands as the fourth fastest indoor miler in the world behind American stars Mary Decker and Francie Larrieu and Russian racer Zmira Zatseva.

Beckford also came through for the Crimson in her anchor leg of the two-mile relay. Although Villanova broke the tape to win the race in 8:49.8, the Harvard quartet stroke to second in its best time of the season, 8:59.5. The Crimson squad--Martha Clabby, Becky Rogers, Kristin Linsley and Beckford--and Villanova's team became the first two-mile relay teams in the nation ever to break nine minutes indoors.

Another Harvard record dropped when senior Ellen Hart crossed the line in 10:32.9 to claim fourth in the two-mile in the earlier heat of the two-mile, Crimson freshman Wiley McCarthy stirred the crowd to a standing ovation as she passed the leader and broke the tape in 11:04.5 Although she didn't place in the top six overall, McCarthy's time is more than a minute faster than her first attempt at the two-mile at the beginning of the season.

Sophomore Kim Johnson tossed the weight more than 43 ft. to garner seventh in the shot put. Northeastern's Sandy Burke won that event with a chuck of 50 ft. 5 1/4 in.