Program Records Fall at Outdoor Heptagonals

At this year’s Indoor Heptagonal Championships, the Harvard women’s track and field team exceeded expectations, stringing together a number of brilliant performances to eek out a five-point victory over Cornell.

In spite of a number of strong individual performances at this weekend’s Outdoor Heps, the Crimson was simply unable to put up enough points to compete with the Big Red. The Harvard women took home third place with a team score of 118 points, while Cornell earned the Ivy League title with 145. On the men’s side, the Crimson recorded 59 team points to finish in fifth place as the Princeton men were dominant, tallying 190 points en route to the Ivy crown.

“The weekend went really well,” Harvard coach Jason Saretsky said. “I think we were able to establish that we’re one of the best teams in the Ivy League. The women had a phenomenal competition…. The men were a bit off from where we had hoped, but still managed to get fifth with a number of individual winners.”

Freshman sprinter Autumne Franklin was one of the Crimson’s top scorers at Heps, which was hosted at Princeton’s Weaver Stadium, as she contributed 28 of the squad’s total points. The rookie began the weekend by taking first place in the 100-meter hurdles with a time of 13.50 seconds, nearly a quarter of a second faster than Penn’s Gabrielle Piper.

Going into the weekend, Franklin boasted the top time in the Ivies in the 400-meter hurdles, as well. Though she was unable to live up to the No. 1 ranking, she crossed the finish line in a personal-best time of 58.70 to earn second place and eight points for Harvard.

“If there was a ‘Freshman of the Meet,’ I think she would be a clear-cut choice,” Saretsky said. “There’s so much that Autumne brings to the table; she’s had a great freshman year.”

The rookie finished the impressive weekend by running in the 4x400 meter relay, which has been strong for the women’s team down the stretch this season. Franklin was joined by classmate Gabrielle Scott, sophomore Christi Scott, and junior Olivia Abbate. Though the foursome was unable to break the school record for the third time this season, their time of 3:39.66 was good for first place.

Also for the Harvard women, senior Mary Hirst capped off the last Heps of her collegiate career in style by winning the heptathlon and the high jump. The veteran had a monster performance in the heptathlon, winning four of the seven events to shatter the school record. Hirst’s point total of 5359 bested the old record, which was set in 2007, by over 250 points. In each of the components of the heptathlon but the high jump, Hirst bettered her personal records.

“I had a whole new edge of competitiveness that I haven’t felt at other meets,” Hirst said.

Of the seven parts that compose the heptathlon, Hirst had her largest margin of victory in the javelin throw. The senior’s throw of 40.29 meters was 10 meters farther than five of her eight competitors.

For the Harvard men, the strongest performances came away from the track, as the squad’s field athletes chipped in a majority of the team’s point total.

The Crimson’s throwing corps earned 18 points in the shot put with a 2-3-4 finish from junior Dustin Brode, and sophomores Ben Glauser and Igor Liokumovich, respectively. Brode was the only Harvard athlete to eclipse 18 meters in the event with a school record-breaking toss of 18.20 meters. The previous record was 18.19 meters and was set in 1969.

“The shot put was an incredible competition,” Saretsky said. “For [Brode] to break that record is a great achievement. I’m guessing that with the throwers we’ve got, they’re going to be going back and forth with that record for a while now.

Sophomore Jarvis Harris was 0.02 seconds shy of breaking his own school record in the 100 meter hurdles, earning first place in the event with a time of 14.15 seconds.

Senior Nico Weiler supplied the first victory of the weekend for the Crimson squad in the pole vault. Weiler, who finished in fourth place at last year’s outdoor NCAA Championships and holds the school record in the event, cleared a height of 5.20 meters to win the Ivy title.

A number of injuries prevented some of the members of both the men’s and women’s team from competing. Freshman Martina Salander, who finished in fifth place at NCAA Indoor National Championships was among the athletes who could not compete for Harvard.

“My guess is that if you called up Cornell and Columbia, the two teams in front of us, they would say they have some injuries, too,” Saretsky said. “We went to Princeton with the best team we had on the day, and I think they competed their hearts out.”

—Staff writer Dominic Martinez can be reached at dmartinez@college.harvard.edu. Follow him on Twitter @dominicmTHC.