Bucknell University Athletics
Bucknell University
Bison Open & Multi
Garcia-Garrison Breaks Program's Record in the Mile at Penn State
1/31/2015 10:09:00 PM | Men's Track and Field
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – The Bucknell men's track and field team broke a longstanding program record for the second straight day as it wrapped up competition at the Penn State National Invitational on Saturday at the Horace Ashenfelter III Indoor Track.
Andrew Garcia-Garrison played a role in both Bison records over the weekend. Fresh off running the mile leg of the record-breaking distance medley relay on Friday, the senior added an individual record on Saturday with a time of 4:02.35, good enough for fifth out of 18 at Penn State and more than two seconds better than the Bucknell record set by Steve West in 1989. The Bison record in the distance medley relay took down a mark that stood since 1979.
Garcia-Garrison's outstanding time was easily faster than the IC4A qualifying standard. Other individual qualifiers on the day for the Bison included senior Christian Lupica, who was third in the 400m with the fifth-fastest time in program history (48.42), senior Kevin Tapper, who took fourth in the 500m with the fastest time by a Bison runner this season (1:04.69), and junior John Westwood with a time of 2:27.01 in the 1,000m.
Sophomore Jacob Ashkettle, junior Anthony Menza, Tapper and Lupica all ran legs on the Bison 4x400 relay team that finished fourth. They crossed the line in an IC4A-qualifying time of 3:18.07.
Senior Brian Monahan took ninth out of 22 in the shot put, but more importantly his toss of 52-11 ½ moved him into sixth on the program's all-time list.
17TH ANNUAL BISON OPEN
LEWISBURG, Pa. – The Bison also concluded competition at the 17th Annual Bison Open on Saturday at Gerhard Fieldhouse and were paced by five runner-up finishes and two new IC4A qualifiers.
Senior Ben Burgess raced out to a lead after four events on the first day of the heptathlon and was the runner-up out of 12 athletes after the final three events were contested on Saturday. His 4,654 points were good enough for fourth on Bucknell's all-time list, while sophomore Christopher D'Aliso took seventh with 4,286 points, good enough for seventh all-time.
Both of Bucknell IC4A qualifiers came in the shot put as Jack Fellows and Joseph Breen took third and fourth out of 31 competitors. Fellows had a throw of 52-4 ¾, while Breen's best toss was 52-1 ¾. Fellows was also second in the weight throw and was followed by Olu Shoyoye and Mark Stafurik in third and fourth, respectively.
Competing in a field of 22 in the high jump, Elijah Kay and Adam Karl tied for second place. Kay cleared 6-4 ¼ on his first jump, while Karl cleared it on his second attempt.
Brian Regan, a member of the Bucknell football team, competed in his first collegiate track meet and took sixth out of 71 runners in the 60-meter dash with a time of 7.23.
Bucknell will again send runners to two separate events next weekend, as one group of athletes will go to the Youngstown Invitational and another will compete in Notre Dame's Meyo Invitational. Both events are scheduled for Friday and Saturday.
Comment from Bucknell head coach Kevin Donner about both events
“It was a great weekend to be a Bison. I was proud of how aggressive our athletes were at Penn State and most of them handled that environment quite well. Obviously the school records in the men's DMR and mile were the highlights, but I was also pleased with a lot of other areas, especially the field events at the Bison Open. We got exactly what we were hoping for this weekend and are looking forward to a great travel weekend competing against a lot of Midwest schools.”
Players Mentioned
