Men’s Track Earns NEWMAC Title to Cap Undefeated Season
This past Saturday, the men’s track and field team won the New England Men’s and Women’s Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) Championship at Coast Guard. Competing on Coast Guard’s newly-constructed track, MIT beat runner-up Springfield by a score of 247 to 210. The victory followed an undefeated season and is the Engineers’ seventh consecutive title.
MIT gained important points in the distance events by sweeping the 5K and 10K. In the first event of the day, Trevor B. Rundell ’09 won the 10K in 32:59.63 and was followed by Jack H. Bourbonnais ’10 (33:11.04), Brian B. Jacokes ’07 (33:18.82) and Tyler W. Abrams ’09 (33:35.15).
The Engineers added more points in the 5K, with Christopher Wong ’08 scoring a 15:24.31 victory over Joseph D. Roy-Mayhew ’08 (15:30.58), Eric A. Khatchadourian ’07 (15:33.04) and Hemagiri Arumugam ’10 (15:34.04), again with no one from other schools in the top four.
Dominant performances in the horizontal jumps also helped MIT. Stephen A. Morton ’10 jumped 21’11” in the long jump to lead a 1-2-3 finish with Christopher B. Bateman ’07 (21’08.75”) and Anthony D. Teixeira ’08 (21’06.75”). Morton came back in the triple jump to win in 46’03.25” over runner-up Teixeira (45’10.50”).
The team has suffered this year from a lack of depth in the sprints and throws, but strong performances nonetheless allowed the Engineers to score points. Morton ran 22.19 in the 200-meter for first place and 11.32 in the 100-meter for second, while the 4 x 100-meter relay team also took first. James R. Oleinik ’09 led the team in the throws with a third-place 48’02.50” in the shotput and a fourth-place 135’04” in the discus.
Several other impressive showings secured MIT’s championship. First place finishes were scored by Jeremiah “Yermie” R. Cohen ’09 in the 1500-meter (3:58.57), Johannes A. Schneider ’10 in the 3000-meter steeplechase (9:44.19) and Gregory D. Tao ’10 in the pole vault (14’08.75”). They were backed up with a fourth-place 50.21 in the 400-meter by William B. Fedus ’10, a 3-4 finish by Matthew F. Bieniosek ’08 (1:58.34) and William S. Phipps ’10 (1:59.05) in the 800-meter, and Teixeira’s runner-up 15.69 in the 110-meter hurdles.
MIT will be competing in the New England Division III Championships next weekend at Springfield, seeded to finish third behind Williams and Tufts.