WEST CHESTER, Pa. – The Haverford College men's track and field team had juniors Nick Gandolfo-Lucia (steeplechase) and Charlie Marquardt (800m) bring home victories in the West Chester Invitational this weekend and had many runners set personal records in their respective events.
The 3,000m steeplechase event had five Haverford runners among the top six finishers. Gandolfo-Lucia won the race with a 9:45.61 while senior John Curry was second (9:58.86). The junior broke his personal best by almost 20 seconds. In his first attempt at the steeplechase, senior Soren Rasmussen (10:07.32) was third and freshman Lincoln Satterthwaite (10:24.72) was fourth. Freshmen Brad Morbeck (10:32.75) and Liam Bassett (10:50.18) came in fifth and ninth.
In the 800m, Marquardt won the race (1:54.14) by six-tenths of a second. Freshman Henry Woods posted his best time in the race (1:59.34) to finish 10th. Freshman Tyler Fong ran in the event for the first time in his career (2:00.17) and placed 12th. Senior Chris Gardner was 14th (2:00.23) while junior Ryan Gooding was 16th (2:00.36) and sophomore Julian Schneider was 20th (2:02.85).
The Fords had three runners in the top ten in the 1,500m race. Senior Joel Christian had a personal best 4:06.93 to cross the finish line in the sixth position. Junior Sam Fujimori was two spots behind his teammate (4:11.38) while sophomore Jimmy Gorman secured the 10th position (4:12.29). Sophomore Evan Hamilton (4:13.53), junior Dylan Verner-Crist (4:13.97), senior David Marsico (4:14.27), junior Bill Ristow (4:15.16) all set personal bests in the event.
Senior Gibby Graves just missed winning the high jump (2.00m) and finished second and picked up a top five finish (fifth) in the long jump (5.96m).
Freshman George Avecillas had a personal best 39.90m javelin throw to place ninth.
Sophomore Alex Frost just missed a top ten finish (11th) in the 100m with an 11.60. He also ran in the 200m (23.84).
Head coach Tom Donnelly's squad will participate in the Princeton Distance Night and Widener Invitational next Friday and continue with the Widener Invitational the next day.