In just three days, the ISU men’s and women’s track and field teams competed in three invitationals, coming out of the busy weekend with numerous personal-best performances and a national attention-drawing run by senior Aisha Praught at the Mt. SAC Relays.

In just three days, the ISU men’s and women’s track and field teams competed in three invitationals, coming out of the busy weekend with numerous personal-best performances and a national attention-drawing run by senior Aisha Praught at the Mt. SAC Relays.

A few Redbirds traveled to Walnut, Calif., to compete in the prestigious Mt. SAC Relays April 19, while the rest of the team represented ISU at the Lenny Lyles Invitational in Louisville, Ky., April 20, before heading to the Vanderbilt Invite in Nashville, Tenn., April 21.

“Anytime you travel from one meet to the next, it starts to take a toll on you mentally,” ISU head coach Elvis Forde said. “It is always difficult, and I think we handled it well. We put forth a lot of consistent efforts over the past three days, and we are right where we want to be.”

Mt. SAC Relays

ISU distance runner Praught drew national attention when she won the Olympic development 3,000-meter steeplechase race with a time of 9:51.3, breaking the Redbird and Missouri Valley Conference records in the process. 

In addition to being the sixth fastest time in the world this year and the top time in the nation by seven seconds, the senior’s performance also qualified her to the Olympic trials in June.

“For Praught to go out and run that fast in her first steeplechase of the year shows just how hard she has been working to get to where she is,” ISU distance coach Jeff Bovee said. “She really ran the perfect race today and put herself out there in the process. Being the first steeple of the season, she still has some room to grow and this is something we can definitely build from.”

Also at the Mt. SAC Relays, sophomore Kristen Zillmer ran a personal-best in the Open A section of the 3,000-meter steeplechase with a time of 10:30.43 for an eighth-place finish.

Lenny Lyles Invite

In Kentucky, the Redbird men’s team earned two wins, while the women’s team earned three.

“I was pleased with the day after watching the kids perform,” Forde said. “The environment of a dual meet encourages the kids to compete and score points, and that is what they did. We still need to have some improvements in certain events, but overall, it was a great day.”

Thrower Brittany Smith took two first-places and a third-place finish. Smith won the hammer throw with a toss of 208’09”, took first in the shot put with a throw of 58’02.5”, and third in the discus (173’05”).

Fellow thrower Curt Jensen also earned top performances, winning the discus with a toss of 159’, before winning the shot put (59’04.75”), and taking third in the hammer (196’04”).

Rachelle Harbert won the women’s pole vault with a mark of 12’03.5”, while Mike Ziegler also won the same event for the men, leaping 15’09”.

In the men’s 400-meter dash, Mat Smoody pulled the come-from-behind to take second with a time of 49.04 seconds.

While ISU earned additional top-spots on the track, the Redbirds closed the day with the 4x400-meter relays, where the men took first and the women took second.

Vanderbilt Invite

While Smith and Smoody continued their top-performances from the Lenny Lyles Invite to the Vanderbilt, other Redbirds also made an impact in Tennessee.

For the women, Tori Ziegler took fourth in the hammer throw (170’07”), while Jake DeJaegher represented the men in the field with a personal-best height in the high jump (6’08”).

Drake Stuedemann (53.62 seconds) took third in the men’s 400-meter hurdles.