Haverford College at Division III Outdoor Championships
HAVERFORD, Pa. – Sophie Drew earned the final qualifying spot in the 1,500 meters for the 2019 NCAA Division III Outdoor Track & Field Championships. The Fords' senior captain has run a personal best time during each of her last six times contesting the 1,500 meters. That streak extends all the way back to the beginning of her junior outdoor season. However, it was her time of 4:38.08 at Swarthmore's final qualifier that locked down the No. 22 seed for the national championships.
No stranger to the national stage from her appearance at the 2017 Division III Cross Country Championships, Drew will be making her first appearance at the outdoor track & field championships when she runs her preliminary heat which is scheduled for 3:55 p.m. this Thursday. Split into two heats, the 1,500 meter race finals are set for Saturday, at 12:25 p.m. The 1,500 meter national championship race will feature 12 runners as the top four finishers from each of the two heats, along with the next four best times. Heat assignments will be announced later this week. The 2019 national championships will be held at the SPIRE Institute in Geneva, Ohio.
Prior to her newest PR at Swarthmore's final qualifier, Drew was coming off of a second place finish at the Centennial Conference Outdoor Championships in this same event. She capped her standout career as a six-time All-Centennial Conference performer, earning those honors twice during the outdoor season and four times on the indoor surface. Drew was part of Haverford's Centennial Conference Championship distance medley relay during her first-year and was on the runner-up 4x800 relay time a total of four times; three times indoors (2016, 18, 19) and once outdoors (2019). She has earned All-Mideast Region honors once during each of the three running seasons.
Drew's qualification makes her the 32nd individual to represent Haverford's women's team at the outdoor track & field national championships. The Fords have gotten 17 All-American finishes (top 8) from those first 31 qualifiers. The 1,500 meters is an event the Fords know well as they have entered a runner in this field eight times. That now includes three straight seasons and four of the last five overall as Katie Sullivan '18 qualified that event twice (2017, 18) while Nora Weathers is the last Fords' runner to earn All-America status in this event as she placed sixth in 2015. Danielle Wolfrom '94 (sixth in 1993) and Meredith Unger '97 (fourth in 1996) also collected All-America honors in this same event.
Drew's name can be found all over the Haverford College record books as she is the seventh-fastest 1,500 meter runner in school history. She won 1,500 meter individual championships at the Bill Butler and Widener Invitational this spring and has won six individual events throughout her track career. Drew has also been part of the fourth and sixth-quickest 4x800 relays during her outdoor career. On the indoor surface, Drew is ranked ninth in both the 1,000 meter and 3,000 meters. She was also on the fourth and seventh-fastest 4x800 relays, along with the ninth-quickest DMR.
In addition to her athletic prowess, Drew has excelled in the classroom as one of Haverford's 16 Ambler Scholar-Athletes, presented to the senior student-athletes with the highest cumulative grade point averages. She is a nine-time Centennial Conference Academic Honor Roll selection, been selected to the Philadelphia Inquirer Academic All-Area team, and will earn USTFCCCA Scholar-Athlete status for the third time later this spring while holding a double-major in biology and Spanish.
Live video and live race results for the entire 2019 NCAA Division III Outdoor Track & Field Championships will be available through the links at the top of this page.