SAN LUIS OBISPO — The Gaucho men and women both dominated in their first and only dual meet of the season against Cal Poly State University.
Notable performances today were highlighted by Barbara Nwaba who competed in the 100m hurdles, high jump and javelin events, and winning all three in clear fashion.
UCSB's Barbara Nwaba won three events in the Gauchos' dual meet win over Cal Poly.
In the throws, Irene Kujore had a great performance winning both the shot put and discus events while Alex Umstead lead the men’s hammer throw and shot put events. Mitchell Haag captured another victory in the high jump while the vertical jumps were lead by John Walsh in the long jump and Arthur Dyson in the triple jump. In the running events, Ryan Martin highlighted the 400m for a new lifetime best time while Shyan Vaziri lead the men’s 1,500m and breaking another PR.
The Gauchos would sweep the first event of the morning in the 3,000 meter steeplechase with Cassie Brooker’s winning the event in a time of 10:55.36, a new personal best for her by more than twenty seconds. Ari Selix and Jessica Chadwick finished 11:05.24 and 11:07.43, respectively. Andrew Pilavjian lead the men the steeple with his second place time of 9:19.25 followed by Bryce Rausa (9:22.72) and Austin Goodheart (9:25.18) all of whom ran personal bests.
Christine Cooperstien had an impressive time in the 1,500m run, setting a new personal best time of 4:33.50 and missing first place by a mere few tenths of a second. Shyan Vaziri lead the men in the 1,500m winning first in the event with his time of 3:48.73, almost another personal best. Tyler Brady finished third, crossing the time in 3:54.71.
Sean Johnson led the men in the 110m hurdles with his time wind-aided time of 14.73. In the 400m, Lauren Kodama finished first (57.13) followed closely behind by Camille Petty (57.32) for second. Grace Esslinger crossed the finish line in 12.18 in the 100m dash for second while Evan Walker ran 10.70 for first place, both wind-aided times.
Ryan Martin had an incredible 400m performance with a new personal best time of 47.09 followed by Karlon Johnson’s PR of 48.53 for second place.
Amanda Rodriguez won the women’s 400m hurdles (1:03.42) while Jimmy Martin placed third on the men’s side (54.63). Jenn Carey ran a wind-aided time of 24.63 in the 200m and good for second while the men swept the 200m with Michael Aiken in first (21.98), followed by Eric Severiano (22.23) and Jacob Vowels (22.25), all wind-aided times.
Nwaba blazed through the 100m hurdles with a wind-aided time of 13.81, cleared 5-11.5 in the high jump and hurled 129-6.5 in the javelin for a triple win victory.
Rusty Parker won the men’s 800m in 1:52.76 for the men and Courtney Lightfoot placed fourth for the women’s 800m with her time of 2:13.26
Ali Palmer earned valuable points in the women’s 5k run, finishing second (18:03.04) for a new personal best. Bhavik Kanzaria crossed the line in 15:01.0 to finish third place.
In the field events, Mitchell Haag capped off a successful performance in the high jump with his winning clearance of 6-10.5 followed by Mike Larocca’s mark of 6-8.5.
The men dominated the jumps with John Walsh’s great performance in the long jump (23-7.25) while Arthur Dyson set a new PR in the triple jump with a clearance of 45-0. Veronica Gines had a winning performance in the long jump clearing 19-3 (wind-aided) while Tayler Williams won the triple jump at 40-3.25 and third in the long jump (18-9.75).
Freshman Katie Lee stepped up to the plate to tie the highest clearance of the day at 11-1.75 for a new personal best while Freshman Andrew Curry lead the men with his pole vault clearance of 15-7 and good for third place.
Likewise, the Gaucho men and women took charge of the throws, winning the hammer throw on the men’s side and the discus and hammer throw events on the women’s side. Irene Kujore had a winning throw of 157-11.25 in the discus as well as the shot put (147-11.5) and Adam Shigem took second (156-11.5) on the men’s side and second in the hammer throw (174-11.5). Alex Francis won the women’s hammer throw (158-4) and placed third in the shot put (43-0) while Veronica Gines took second (153-5.25) and throwing a new personal record by several inches.
Alex Umstead lead the men’s hammer throw with his winning mark of 179-7.5 and placed second in the shot put (55-5.25) In the javelin, Grace Esslinger threw 127-3 while Michael Guerra threw 197-1.75, both athletes earning second place.
The women’s and men’s 4x400m relay squad both beat out Cal Poly with the women finishing in 3:48.60 and the men in 3:15.80. In the 4x100m relay event, the women’s squad beat out Cal Poly while the men crossed the line nine-tenths of a second after the Cal Poly men’s 4x100m team.
Next up, the multi event athletes will head down to UC Irvine on May 4-5 for the Big West Conference multi-event finals.
