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HomeSportsTrack and Field wraps pre-Christmas slate strong

Track and Field wraps pre-Christmas slate strong

APSU Women’s Track and Field

Austin Peay State University GovernorsMurfreesboro, TN – Austin Peay State University women’s track and field team had another noteworthy showing, Saturday, at Middle Tennessee’s Christmas Invitational.

Head coach Doug Molnar was impressed at his team’s efforts and all around performance in a meet that included a pair of competitive Sun Belt teams (Middle Tennessee and Western Kentucky), along with Ohio Valley Conference member Tennessee State.

“I can see the confidence growing from week one to week two,” Molnar said. “This is a group that is going to continue to grow.”

APSU Women's Track and Field. (Courtesy: Austin Peay Sports Information)
APSU Women's Track and Field. (Courtesy: Austin Peay Sports Information)

In the field events, the Lady Govs were spurred by April Holman’s third-place high jump finish. For the second consecutive week, Holman set a personal best, this time at 5’4. Also freshman Caitlin Tassell won the pole vault with a 9’ height.

Candace Johnson showed vigor in the distance races, finishing eighth ahead of Chiamaka Obi, in the 400-meter run and fourth in the 200-meter dash. Latoya Monger, meanwhile, finished third in the 55-meter hurdles.

Austin Peay finished ahead of MTSU and WKU in the 4×400-meter relay with a 4:01.71 time, which was almost a full second faster than the Saluki Fast Start finish.

Latoya Monger“Latoya Monger ran one of her more aggressive races in the hurdles,” Molnar said. “April is continuing to improve each meet, with her second personal best in two meets. Our mile relay team did a really good job again as well.”

The test for Molnar and the Austin Peay team will be maintaining this momentum over the traditional Christmas break. This season marked the first time since December 2007 the Lady Govs have had a meet prior to the Spring semester’s start.

With the strong showings in Carbondale, IL and in Murfreesboro, Molnar has placed an emphasis on not sliding back during the break.

“We had a team meeting afterwards,” Molnar said. “We’re off to a great start, probably the best we’ve had in the past five or six years. We told them, in order to make that next step and go to the next level as a team, what we do over the next three weeks is going to be key.”
 
Austin Peay returns to action, January 8th, at the Ed Temple Classic, hosted by Tennessee State in Nashville.

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