PALO ALTO, Calif. (April 1, 2023) – The UC Santa Barbara Track and Field teams wrapped up their weekend, with the distance runners making their way to the San Francisco State Invitational while the rest of the track team made the trip to the Stanford Invitational. With the tough competition at each of these meets, the Gauchos made their impact with multiple top performances along the way.
Amanda Spear was one of those performers as she finished second in the discus with a throw of 50.33 meters, only sitting behind one thrower from Hawai'i. Her fellow thrower, Jared Freeman, also had a strong performance but in the hammer. The redshirt sophomore ended his time in Palo Alto in fifth in the Invite division, throwing for a distance of 60.22 meters. Another thrower, Chase Tarr, also grabbed fifth in the Invite division, recording a throw of 60.15 meters in the javelin.
From the pole vault, the Gauchos had top performers on both the men's and women's sides. Melodie Quiroz topped her own PR in this event, earning a mark of 3.92 meters to tie for second. Her counterpart, Eitan Goore, came out with the win in his event. He ended the meet with a mark of 4.90 meters, grabbing the first-place finish.
On the track, four individuals had strong performances, and they were Brendan Fong, Tyler Holl, Ethan Godsey and Abigail Monti. Fong has been crucial to the Gauchos on the track, earning a third-place finish in his section with a time of 48.48 seconds in the 400-meter dash. Holl finished in the top half of the field in the 110-meter hurdles, running a time of 14.51 seconds for a new PR. Godsey was one of the few distance runners in Palo Alto as he competed in the 5000-meter race, putting up a new PR of 14:21.3 in the event. Also rounding out the performances on the track was Monti, who ran a new PR in the 400-meter hurdles with a time of 1:02.4.
In San Francisco, the Gauchos had one runner in the shorter distances with the rest running mid-distance and distance events. Chika Nwachukwu hit PR's in both the 100 and 100 hurdles, running a time of 12.27 seconds in the 100 and 14.66 seconds in the 100 hurdles. The Gauchos had three runners in the 3000-meter steeplechase and they were Stina Johansson, Sierra Ransweiler and Madeleine Franco as the three finished in fifth, sixth and 10th, respectively. The women also capitalized in the 800 as Sarah Chaves, Ruby Sirota-Foster and Isabella Abusaid all competed in this event. Of the 103 people who competed in this event, these three grabbed finishes of 19th, 22nd and 28th, respectively.
The men's side saw Manan Vats, Travis Bryson and Matt Richardson. Bryson grabbed a 10th-place finish out of 121 runners in the 800, running a time of 1:53.96 to get there. Richardson had a stellar performance in the 3000-meter steeplechase as he ended up in sixth place with a time of 9:10.96. Vats rounded out this group as he ran in the 10K, where he ran a time of 30:53.79 for a 16th-place finish in a field of 55 runners.
The Gauchos will have a quick turnaround as they compete in their last home event of the season in the Challenge Cup on Friday, April 7. The first event will begin at noon with the throws. For a full schedule, visit ucsbgauchos.com.
