Pioneer LogLewis & Clark College’s Student-Run Newspaper

Success and personal records mark 2010 track season

April 30, 2010

by Lindsey Bosse

This past weekend concluded the track and field season for Lewis & Clark at the NWC Championships in Spokane, Wash.  Coming off of a strong season, the women placed sixth with 81 points and the men took eigth with 23.  The women scored the most points they have in a long time. Although they kept their sixth place from last year, they were only three points off of fifth place Pacific Lutheran.

“It’s when you fall short like that, that you look around and notice the missed opportunities, but that’s the nature of competition,” said coach David Fix.  

The women were able to score in 16 of 21 events, showing great growth from recent years.  Lishka Havel (’10), who was also named LC Athlete of the Year, was the high scorer of the meet with 21 points (not including her points from the NWC Heptathlon). She was able to set new personal records in the 100-meter and the 200-meter, and also come in second in the 200, which earned her All-Conference.  Cheyenne Feliz (’11) got All-Conference by taking third in the 200 and also posted a personal record of 25.97; she was also able to take the podium for the 400-meter with another personal best.  Finishing off her first year of track, Illana Livstrom (’13) came in second in the 1500-meter run with a time of 4:49.11, barely five seconds off of first place. Alla Khalitova (’11) ended up in a tiebreaker for first during the high-jump, finishing with 5’8” and second place.  She too, was named All-Conference along with her three other teammates.  

The men struggled a bit more than the women, especially with sprinters who have been dealing with injuries all season.

“Our sprinters’ injuries were our Achilles heel this season,” said Fix.  “We weren’t able to score in our individual events, which is frustrating.”

Only one man on the men’s side was able to make All-Conference, although several others scored for the team.  John Berokoff (’13) won third place in the javelin throw with a distance of 184’9”.  Karl Dickman (’10) had a strong two days of racing, earning a seventh place in the 5000-meter and fifth in the 10,000-meter two days apart from each other; Dickman was also named LC Athlete of the Year.  

“We had high expectations for this season and it was a bitter-sweet ending,” Fix said.  “We did well, but we could have accomplished more.  It leaves us with some unmet goals for next year.”

The team is losing four seniors from both the men and women’s teams, but will still have a strong group of first-years from this year moving up to continue their success.