Michigan
NCAA Indoor Championships
Michigan Distance Medley Relay Takes Sixth at NCAAs
3/8/2019 11:54:00 PM | Women's Track & Field
Site: Birmingham, Ala. (Birmingham CrossPlex)
Event: NCAA Indoor Championships (Day 1 of 2)
U-M Result: 3 points (Tied for 22nd of 34 teams)
Next U-M Event: Saturday, March 9 -- NCAA Indoor Championships – Day Two (Birmingham, Ala.), 4:10 p.m. CST
• Complete Results (PDF) | Photo Gallery
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. -- The distance medley relay team earned first team All-America honors and distance runner Hannah Meier clinched a berth to the mile final as the University of Michigan women's track and field team logged a successful opening day of the NCAA Indoor Championships on Friday (March 8).
The quartet of first-time NCAA competitors Alice Hill, Chloe Foster, Aurora Rynda and Meg Darmofal combined to finish sixth overall in the relay in 11:08.55, while Meier posted the second-fastest time of the speedy prelims in 4:36.34.
With the three team points posted by the relay by virtue of its sixth-place finish, Michigan is tied for 22nd in the team standings. The Wolverines will have a second scoring opportunity on Saturday as the pre-meet top seed Meier goes for the national title in the mile at 4:10 p.m. CT.
Hill led off the relay with a 3:25.73 split for the 1,200-meter leg, running near the front of a tightly-bunched pack for nearly 1,000 meters of her share of the race. With one lap to go, Hill was running fourth at the head of a chase pack that was in pursuit of BYU, Villanova and Oklahoma State.
Michigan was positioned fifth in a crowded exchange zone as Hill gave the baton to Foster for her 400-meter duties. A 54.85 split for Foster, including a moment on the final backstretch where she briefly climbed up through the field before being boxed in around the final turn, put Michigan in eighth as she handed off to Rynda.
After the first 400 meters of her 800-meter leg, Rynda moved up a spot to seventh and ultimately completed the final exchange to Darmofal in sixth. She clocked 2:07.32 for her portion of the relay.
Darmofal, making her first appearance with the Michigan "A" team in relief of mile finalist Meier, availed herself admirably in the 1,600-meter anchor leg with a split of 4:40.67 that is superior to her career-best 4:43.13 in the mile.
Early in the leg, the top eight teams were all queued up in a strung-out, single-file line with Michigan in eighth. A breakaway eventually formed with the top five teams, leaving Darmofal to battle it out with Washington's Lilli Burdon -- the anchor of last season's national champion team for Oregon -- for the better part of a half-mile to determine who would finish sixth.
Darmofal would eventually win that battle, pulling away from Burdon in the final lap to secure the Wolverines' sixth-place finish.
Earlier in the day, Meier booked her ticket to Saturday's mile final with a 4:36.34 clocking and on the strength of a surge to the front of the pack on the final lap.
After running along the rail in the front half of a fast, packed-up field through the first 1,200 meters of the race, Meier made an initial move up and to the outside to clear herself from traffic with two laps to go.
That move allowed her the opportunity to take the lead at the bell on the last lap, bringing in tow with her a lead group of five other runners. Six would suddenly become four as Oregon's Susan Ejore and Providence's Millie Paladino got mixed up and tumbled to the track directly behind Meier.
With the lead group of four now well clear of the rest of the field and all virtually assured of claiming the four automatic berths to the final, Meier ultimately finished runner-up to Boise State's Alexis Fuller by .07 of a second.
Six of the 11 qualifiers to Saturday's final all finished within a second of one another, and 10 of the 11 ran faster than 4:40, setting up what is sure to be a quick race for the title. An 11th woman, Paladino, was advanced as the result of the review and protest process due to her role in the last-lap crash.
Full Michigan Results by Event
Q = Automatic qualifier into final; q = non-automatic qualifier into final
Mile
PRELIMS (Final to be contested Saturday at 4:10 p.m. CT)
2. Hannah Meier / 4:36.34
Distance Medley Relay
6. Hill, Foster, Rynda, Darmofal / 11:08.55
Players Mentioned
