Case Western Reserve University junior Ben Zelkin broke the school-record in the 60-meter dash to highlight a slew of strong Spartan performances at the SPIRE Inviational hosted by Carnegie Mellon University in Geneva, Ohio on Saturday.
With seven top-five finishes at the meet, the Spartan men placed third out of 12 teams in action with 62 points. The women, who tallied six top-five finishes, placed seventh out of 13 teams at the meet with 44 points.
Zelkin set the school-record in the 60-meter preliminaries with a time of 6.96, besting the previous school-record of 7.07 set by sophomore Rasheed Ajala last season. Zelkin placed third in the finals of the 60-meter dash with a time of 7.15.
The Spartan men totaled two first place finishes on the day, with freshman Dominic Oddo winning the long jump with a distance of 6.40 meters and senior Nathaniel Wahner placing first in the 400-meter dash with a time of 49.92.
Adding a third-place finish was junior Grant Mlack in the 400-meter dash (50.13), while senior Nico Ericksen-Deriso in the 400-meter dash (50.77) and Mlack in the 60-meter hurdles (8.94) added fourth-place finishes. Wahner also contributed a fifth-place finish in the 60-meter dash with a time of 7.31.
Winning events for the Spartan women on Saturday were junior Cassandra Laios and senior Temi Omilabu. Laios finished first in the shot put with a toss of 11.57 meters, and also placed fourth in the weight throw with a mark of 13.78 meters. Omilabu won the weight throw with a mark of 15.22 meters.
Adding top performances by a Spartan woman during the meet were freshman Melissa Cuellar in the shot put (third, 11.31 meters), sophomore Mikhaylan Price in the weight throw (fifth, 13.20 meters) and junior Skylar Braga in the triple jump (fifth, 9.24 meters).
The Spartans will return to competition next weekend when the team hosts the 9th Annual Battle for the Obelisk on Saturday, January 28th against Carnegie Mellon University. Field Events are set to begin at 2:00 p.m.
