Meet Results

ITHACA, N.Y. -- The Big Red women's track team had a very good trip to Happy Valley on Saturday, qualifying 14 for the ECACs and winning two events at the Penn State Nittany Lion Challenge.
 
With very good teams from Maryland, Pitt, Oklahoma, Albany and host Penn State, the Cornell women also had more than 20 top-five event finishes, a new school record and national leader.
 
One of the truly outstanding performers was junior Rachel Sorna, who placed second in the mile and later won the 3K in a new school record and NCAA leading time. The cross country All-American began her day with a 24-second personal best in the mile, running 4:47.32 to place second, one of the top 10 times in the nation in the early going of the 2013 season. Her time is also No. 4 all-time at Cornell.
 
Three hours later, Sorna doubled back very impressively, winning the 3K, this time producing a 28-second personal best of 9:18.17 to break the school record of Toni-Lynn Salucci '07 by five seconds, the fastest time in the NCAA so far this season.
 
The Cornell distance women were very strong as a group as well in these events. In the mile, junior Emily Shearer (fourth, 4:55.69) and senior Genna Hartung (fifth, 4:56.96) were ECAC qualifiers, and senior co-captain Katie Kellner was the fourth Cornellian under 5:00 in ninth in 4:59.63.
 
In the 3K, Cornell took the top five places: Kellner (second, 9:52.02), junior Devin McMahon (third, 9:52.79, a personal best), freshman Caroline Kellner (fourth, 9:53.11, another personal record) were ECAC qualifiers, and freshman Dina Iacone rounded out the top five in 10:12.26.
 
The women's distance medley relay also ran very well, placing second in the ninth-best time in school history, 11:42.58 behind good legs from Hartung (3:38.6 for 1,200), sophomore Elyse Wilkinson (58.5 for 400), sophomore Tess Berghoff (2:14.4 for 800) and Shearer (4:51.2 for 1,600). Also in the relays, the Big Red's 4x400 won its heat and placed second in an ECAC-qualifying time of 3:47.40 with sophomore Emily Woodford (58.5), junior Ebolutalese Airewele (56.1), sophomore Katie Woodford (56.4) and junior Ryan Woolley (56.1) all running well.
 
There were several other ECAC qualifiers as well. Airewele won her heat of the 400 in commanding fashion to take third overall in 55.81, good for No. 10 all-time at Cornell. And classmate Lauren Lloyd had a great debut for 2013, placing fourth in the 1,000 in an ECAC-qualifying 2:54.20.
 
Senior co-captains Ailish Hanly and Victoria Imbesi yet again bettered the Eastern standard, with Hanly placing third in the high jump at 5' 8” (equaling No. 4 all-time at Cornell) and Imbesi placing second in the shot put with a throw of 48' 2”. Fellow senior Lindsey Patterson had a very good day, winning the pole vault with an ECAC-qualifying clearance of 12' 1 1/2”. Classmate Claire Dishong was second in 11' 7 3/4”.
 
Also in the field, junior Kelley Roach had a huge personal best in the triple jump to place sixth in 38' 1 1/2” and classmate Shannon Daniles was seventh in the long jump at 17' 6 12”.
 
There were several other notable performances on the track. Berghoff won the 800 in a fine early season time of 2:16.41, while freshman Halle Heiden was third in 2:19.51. Sophomore Mina Amick-Alexis advanced to the finals of the 60 hurdles in a personal-record time of 8.91 and then lowered it to 8.86 with a fifth-place effort in the finals, good for No. 8 all-time at Cornell. In the 600, Wilkinson was third in 1:33.99 while sophomore Ally Knudson was sixth in 1:36.91. Ryan Woolley was fifth in the 400 in 57.09 (barely missing ECACs) and Katie Woodford was fourth in the 200 at 25.36.
 
Next up for the Big Red is the Upstate Challenge on Saturday, a scored meet featuring Binghamton, Buffalo, Syracuse, Ithaca College and Cortland.