Track & Field: Princeton preps for Heptagonals

“It’s an interesting meet from the point of view that there are four, maybe five, teams that will score a decent amount of points,” head women’s coach Peter Farrell said. “It’s not a runaway for any one team, and it’s not a dual meet — it’s really an open meet as far as the team title goes.”

Each of the 33 selected athletes on both the men’s and women’s Heps squads will be counted on to race well and score points if the Tigers are to pull out a victory. As always, depth across many events is critical.

“There are few areas in which we shouldn’t score,” Farrell said. “We’re strong in the sprints this year. We’re strong in the vault. We have a good hurdler. We’re strong in middle distance running — it’s a pretty balanced program.”

This past weekend’s Princeton Invitational provided another good opportunity for the Tigers to sharpen up across those different event groups. Although many chose to rest rather than race, for several athletes the last-minute competition was a perfect moment to bring everything together.

Flying over the high hurdles, junior Richard Sheldon confirmed that he will be a deep scoring threat at Cornell. After overcoming a sluggish preliminary, Sheldon sprinted to a new personal best of 8.10 seconds in the 60m-hurdle final.

“It felt like a really good race, especially towards the end,” Sheldon said. “As I go into the championship this weekend, I have the number-two time, so it makes me excited.”

In the sprints, freshman Daniel McCord won his first collegiate race, taking the 200m in 22.33 seconds.

The women’s field athletes also continued to improve. Junior Tory Worthen excelled once again in the pole vault, scaling 3.96 meters to record her fourth win of the season. Meanwhile, sophomore Chelsea Cioffi launched a career best in the weight throw, reaching 47 feet, 10.50 inches.

Whether they rested or perfected technique on Saturday, the Tigers are anxious to compete and to defend their title. With Cornell’s devastating power in the shorter sprints, the Tigers will need to accumulate as many points as possible in the distances, while Princeton’s improving sprinters have to fight for all the places and points they can get.

“It’s always a really, really great meet,” Sheldon said. “Us and Cornell are neck and neck — we’re looking at what they’re doing and how we’re doing, trying to figure out who has an edge. It’s an exciting time.”

While Cornell will be the main challenger for the men’s title, the Tigers still need to be careful to prevent competitors from other schools from stealing points away from events that Princeton needs to dominate.

Both Columbia and Harvard could potentially impact Princeton’s advantage in the longer running events. In terms of individual titles, an interesting matchup between the league’s two sub-four minute milers, Columbia’s Kyle Merber and Princeton junior Peter Callahan, is possible.

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With the bulk of the season and training behind them, the hay is in the barn for the Tigers. When both teams travel to Ithaca this weekend, all they need to focus on is competing and giving their all.

“They’re a classy group with a good hold on what it takes to be competitive,” Farrell said. “They’ve worked well and hard and are positioned very well for a run at it.”