Oregon State
SF State Distance Carnival
Gomez Continues Strong Start To 2013 At Stanford Invite
March 29, 2013 | Women's Track & Field
March 29, 2013
Stanford Invite Results | SF State Distance Carnival Results
CORVALLIS, Ore. - Kinsey Gomez finished second in her heat of the 5K at the Stanford Invitational and Chelsa McDonnell came in seventh overall in the 3,000 steeplechase at the San Francisco State Distance Carnival, as the pair led a group of seven OSU track & field student-athletes split between two meets in the Bay Area on Friday.
Gomez displayed dramatic improvement over last year in the 5,000, running her fourth-ever try at the distance in 16:38.79, the fourth-fastest time in Oregon State history. The eventual winner went out fast from the start and Gomez was in second for much of the race, gaining on the leader in the last lap before coming up just short.
"She ended up running quite a bit of the race by herself," Oregon State head coach Kelly Sullivan said. "Her performance is probably even more impressive with the fact that she wasn't in a pack and getting pulled along by a lot of other runners. It indicates she can run a lot faster."
The sophomore easily eclipsed a couple of her relevant marks in the event from 2012. Last season, Gomez competed in the 5K at the same meet and ran 17:21.43. Her time today cut more than 30 seconds off of her previous best in the 5,000, which was a time of 17:11.68 registered at the Pacific Twilight on April 27, 2012.
A time of 16:38.79 would have placed Gomez just outside automatic qualifiers for last year's NCAA West Regional, but she will have a couple more opportunities this season to better that mark and earn herself a postseason berth.
"Kinsey was saying after she was done that she didn't feel all that tired and felt really good on her cool down," Sullivan added. "It would have been really good to see what she would have done if she was in the third heat. Chances are she may have run another eight to ten seconds faster based off how she felt. We'll get her in one more, if not two, and I think she's pretty confident she can run in the 16:20's."
Further up the peninsula at San Francisco State, Chelsa McDonnell ran her first 3,000 steeplechase in two years in 11:20.87, a very respectable mark considering her layoff in the event. The New Mexico State transfer has a PR of 10:55.99 in the 3,000 steeple, which she reached at the 2011 Western Athletic Conference (WAC) Championships, and her time today ranks seventh all-time at OSU.
"The thing about the steeple is that it's such a unique event," Sullivan said. "You have to run one to even get a feel for what it's like. She didn't look confident at some points, but we know she's definitely ready to run a lot faster. She needed to have this one under her belt to shake the rust off a little bit. We'll run her in the steeple in two weeks down at Oregon and we should see a big drop for her."
Rounding out Oregon State's competitors at Stanford, freshmen Emily Weber and Kira Kelly ran their first-ever 5,000's. The duo raced in the same heat, in which Weber finished eighth with a time of 17:06.04 while her teammate came in not far behind, crossing in 17:17.45 to finish 10th.
"Those are really big freshmen jumps," Sullivan said. "Emily and Kira both came in under the radar as far as recruits are concerned. To put it in perspective, Kinsey [Gomez] ran 17:22 last year in the exact same race."
Taylor Nowlin, running her first steeple of the season, finished 11th in her heat of the event with a time of 10:50.70. She nearly took a fall over the first water jump after getting bottled up with a couple of others, but recovered to run her fastest-ever opening steeple and come within four seconds off her PR.
Four other Beavers ran at SFSU alongside McDonnell. Whitney Pitman finished 13th in the 3,000-meter steeplechase with a time of 11:30.88. Kelsi Schaer, battling an illness, muscled through the 1,500 with a mark of 4:39.60, good enough for 10th overall. Emily LaValley ran her 1,500-meter race in 4:47.46.
Aly Nielson, Oregon State's lone competitor in the 5,000 at the Distance Carnival, ran 17:48.16 to finish 39th out of a field of 81.
Lacey London (1,500), Kristin Coffman (1,500) and Sandra Martinez (5K) were all scratched from the meet at SFSU due to various minor illnesses and ailments.
Running her first 5K in two years, former All-American Laura Carlyle finished her heat of the event at the Stanford Invite in fifth place with a time of 16:08.14.
The Beavers will be closer to home the remainder of the regular-season schedule, which begins next weekend at the Willamette Invitational in Salem. OSU will leave the state of Oregon just once before the Pac-12 Championships in Los Angeles in early May when it returns to Stanford for the Payton Jordan Invite on April 28.
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