SF State’s track and field team gave a solid performance at their home turf during the Johnny Mathis Invitational on Friday and Saturday afternoon at Cox Stadium. The event featured both women and men’s clubs competing from campuses across the state.
Although the Gators didn’t have any participants throwing the hammer or launching the javelin on Friday, the team managed to make noise with their legs during numerous track events on Saturday.
Junior Evan Jackson qualified for the conference tournament after finishing seventh overall during the men’s 800-meter run with a time of 1:57.84. He was also one of four Gators to compete in the 1500-meter run, finishing 12th out of 49 total participants.
“Today was a really good day for the team,” said Aidan Murtagh, a distance runner for SF State. “We bounced back really well from our last home meet. We had really stand-up performances on both sides — men and women had a lot of great debuts for our team. Actually, a lot of the young runners, or maybe people coming back from injury, were doing really well.”
Murtagh competed in the men’s 1500-meter run alongside Jackson and freshman Dominic Clima, who emptied the tank during the final stretch of the race to secure a first-place finish in section 1. To do so, Clima was able to zoom past teammates Murtagh, John Eikemeyer and finally Brandon Johnson.
“It was nice seeing Brandon up there because this is his second race back from being hurt,” Clima said. “So I figured if Brandon could get up there and could do it, then so can I. I saw I had him so I just snuck past him and it was just cool to get there because I’ve never been that far.”
Clima, a former cross country star at Branham High School in San Jose, was very close to being tardy to the 1500-meter run after mistakenly thinking the starting official was on the opposite end of the track.
“We’re like, ‘What the heck is this guy doing? We almost missed him and he ended up winning it,” Murtagh said.
Realizing his faux pas, Clima was able to quickly make his way back before the starter pistol was triggered.
The women’s 1500 meter section 1 race consisted of two SF State athletes, sophomore Olivia Renfro, who placed fourth in the competition and sophomore Sydney Seyer, who placed sixth.
Preparation for the race was business as usual for Seyer.
“Making sure you get a lot of sleep or extra sleep and try to get 10 hours a night,” Seyer said. “Water hydration and food is really important, especially right before you race, you do not want to eat right before and you want to make sure you get enough by the end of the night. Just a good mentality. I walk myself through the race the night before and just go through the whole race.”
Seyer’s mentality was likely a key factor in her success this weekend, pushing her to a personal record for the 1500-meter race at a time of 5:40.06.
Coming into the meet, Seyer was a week removed from getting her wisdom teeth removed and was afraid of falling short of her expectations.
“I was stressed and thought, ‘I am going to do bad,’ but honestly I did really good so I am happy with that,” Seyer said.“My teammates also did really well, one of them was out for most of the season and this was her first race so it was really great. It was so great having them to race with and I think they are both really happy with their performance.”
Lamiah George, who ran in this event unattached, dominated the 100-meter race as she placed first in her section and the entirety of the 100-meter race. She displayed a time of 12.60, which beat out the second-best runner by .18 seconds.
Unattached runners are common when an athlete is redshirting. They are prohibited from donning their school colors and can’t reveal their team affiliation to protect their eligibility years. Once one race is run in uniform, the NCAA counts it as an entire track season.
Out of the 18 contestants in the long jump, SF State freshman Gianna Myer placed third in the competition with a mark of 4.86 meters. Last weekend she finished 23rd in the competition, so this was a big jump for Myer, who stepped up for the team.
The track and field team heads to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo’s Miller & Capriotti Athletics Complex on Thursday for the Mustang Invitational. The meet will be held on Friday, April 21.
