Last Saturday, several Duhawks had dominant performances at the track and field meet at Monmouth College, IL. Overall, the men’s team came in third, and the women came in fifth.

Perhaps the most exciting event was the women’s 800-meter run, where junior Laura Rieger and senior Hannah Weiss came in first and second place, with times of 2:12.33 and 2:12.51, respectively. This is the second time that they took first and second in the 800-meter run. This time, however, they made it to nationals with their times. Rieger is now ranked third in the country, and Weiss is ranked fifth.

“I was very happy for Laura and Hannah to both go under the school record and to go 1-2 in such a strong field,” said Coach Bob Schultz. “They ran an excellent race.  They went out smart, and finished strong.”

Weiss did better than she thought she was going to.

“For me, I had no idea that we were running so well.  The race was pretty cramped until the last 100 meters, and our time through the 600-meter mark was a little slow in comparison to other times, but we were both able to finish really well,” she said. “Having someone to push yourself with during the tough races really helps keep you going. It’s been awesome being able to run with a teammate like this.”

Some other top scores for the women include sophomore Genna Kinley, who came in first in the women’s 1000-meter run, and senior Barb Kremer came in first in the women’s 100-meter hurdles and seventh in the long jump. Senior Mary Bridget Corken came in first in the women’s 1500-meter run. Junior Danielle McNally came in sixth followed by junior Heidi Tobin, who came in seventh in the women’s discus throw. McNally also came in fifth for the women’s hammer throw.

The men were led by senior Tyler Myer who came in first in the men’s 1,000-meter run. First-year Tim Derr came in third in the men’s 100-meter hurdles. Junior Mike Higgins came in fifth in the men’s 3000-meter steeple chase. Junior Cody Dryer came in fourth in the men’s 1500-meter run. Senior Chris Swift came in first in the men’s 400-meter hurdles. First-year Austin Arthofor came in fifth in the men’s 200-meter dash. Junior Dain Leytem came in third in the men’s 5000-meter run. Senior Elliot McAllister came in second for the men’s hammer throw.

Their upcoming meet is on May 8, at the University of Madison, Wisconsin, for the twilight invitational. However, two women and one man will be competing at the IIAC hep/decathlon in Storm Lake from May 7 to 8.

After dominating performances at their own meet, the men’s and women’s cross-country teams have spent the past two weeks gearing up for the Iowa Conference Championships, which will take place Saturday in Waverly, Iowa, home of Wartburg College.

After the conference meet, the Duhawks will prepare for the regional meet, which they hope will vault them into the NCAA Division III Nationals.

But no one is thinking about that right now. The conference meet will be a daunting challenge, as the Iowa Conference often has several teams ranked high in Division III.

“I like our chances, I think we are going to surprise a lot of teams,” said Coach Bob Schultz. “If we run very well, I believe both teams could finish second.”

Schultz said both teams have shown many improvements over the stretch of the season, and he is confident that they will perform well this weekend. His philosophy is to run hard throughout the regular season and then taper off for the postseason.

“We race tired all year to run our best at Conference, Regionals and, hopefully, Nationals,” he said. “We have started to back off our training. The work is done. Now it is time to get our legs back and race fresh for the first time all season.”

Both teams finished first in the Dr. Robert Tucker Invitational, which Loras hosted Oct. 16 at the Dubuque Soccer Complex. Schultz said both teams looked strong.

In the women’s race, 10 Duhawks finished among the top 12 runners. Junior Tara Kilburg won the 6K race, followed by seniors Hannah Weiss, who was the runner-up, and Erica Stevens, who finished third. First-year Ashley Schoenoff finished fifth in the race.

In the men’s race, four Duhawks placed among the top eight runners. Junior Ryan Engelman won the race, while junior Mike Higgins was the runner-up. Junior Dain Leytem finished seventh and first-year Austin Steil was eighth.

“I like having our home meet the last meet before conference, and I also like that it is a low key meet,” Schultz said. “A win on both sides hopefully gives our team the confidence that they are a good team and ready to race at the Conference Championships.”

Jack Metz

The cross-country men’s and women’s teams continued making good progress with their top-five finishes in Division 2 at the National Catholic Cross Country Invitational at Notre Dame.

The women’s team, which won the Division 2 title last year, finished third among 24 teams. Bellarmine and Franciscan universities were the only two small-college teams to beat the Loras women, which was paced by several strong runs in the 3.1-mile race.

Junior Tara Kilburg and senior Hannah Weiss finished 39th and 40th, respectively, among 260 small- and big-college runners who finished the race. Kilburg cross the line in 19 minutes, 29 seconds; and Weiss was one second behind her. Senior Erica Stevens and junior Meghan Wolett nearly eclipsed the 20-minute mark to finish in 64th and 67th places, respectively.

The men finished in fifth place among 25 teams in Division 2. It finished behind Bellarmine University, Wheeling Jesuit University, Sienna Heights University and Marian University in the standings.

Coach Bob Schultz said the men had strong runs by four of their top runners on the 5-mile course. The Duhawks were led by junior Dain Leytem, who crossed the line with a time of 27 minutes, 16 seconds. Leytem finished 56th among 216 small- and big-college runners who finished the race. Junior Mike Higgins and senior Tyler Meyer both finished within four seconds of Leytem. First-year Austin Steil finished his second collegiate race just 10 seconds behind Higgins and Meyer.
Schultz was excited with the results.

“I was very happy with both teams’ results. Much better than our first meet. I feel much better about our teams reaching their goals at the end of the season based on their performance at Notre Dame,” he said.

The runners will travel to Augustana College this weekend to compete in the Brisman-Lundeen Invitational. Schultz has different plans for the weekend race ahead to let the teams’ younger runners get some experience.

“We are resting our varsity upperclassman to give some other athletes a chance to score on our top seven and to give the freshmen an extra race at the college distance,” Schultz added. “It’s a learning experience on a very fast course.”

Michael Higgins
Published: April 22, 2009

DUBUQUE -The Loras track and field team is off to another great start in the outdoor season SportsZone caught up with one athlete who has something new to contribute.

Three Thousand meters, thirty-five hurdles, including six water barriers was the challenge in front of senior middle distance runner Joey Hetland last Saturday at the University of Dubuque Open.

“I’ve never been able to run at conference because we had a pretty stacked mid-distance team the four years that I have been here so I wanted to run the steeplechase in order to do that,” said Joey.

“He was looking for events that weren’t terribly deep in where he could contribute and steeplechase is one of them and he’s a mid distance guy so for an eight hundred runner to say hey I want to do the steeplechase that is quite a step and I’m just proud of him. I think a lot of people take that for granted just running at the conference championship and I think for Joey that would be the icing on the cake for his career,” said track and field coach Bob Schultz.

Moving up in distance from the eight-hundred meter and mile races, Joey has been able to use his cross country experience to adjust. The hurdles were another story.

“I was really nervous about the water pit, I’ve never jumped into one of those before so once I got through those I knew I was alright, I wanted to finish the race after that,” said Joey.

Joey and other Duhawks will be competeing here at the Loras Open this weekend. The event starts at ten o’clock on Saturday morning.

Michael Higgins can be contacted at Michael.Higgins@loras.edu

Mike Higgins
Published: April 9, 2009

Waverly/Dubuque – The Duhawk track and field team made a trip to Waverly, Iowa last weekend to compete against their rival Wartburg College and other division three schools.

Although the meet was a success for most athletes, some members of the team have not been able to compete due to injuries and illnesses. Most of these injured runners have been on the distance team.

“At first I had knee problems during cross country, then I got those fixed, and since then I have had left hip trouble, straining my hip flexor,” said Dan Murphy, a junior distance runner.

“This season has started kind of slow considering I started out with having mono and wasn’t able to compete during the indoor season because of it,” said Lindsey Robinson, a Freshman mid-distance runner.

Most of the sprinters on the team have been staying healthy and ran some personal bests at the Wartburg Invite.

“Overall the Wartburg meet went pretty well. I was pleased with everyone performances, especially with the weather being considered,” said Matt Jones, the Loras sprinter coach. “We’ve only had a few minor bumps and bruises along the way, but nothing real severe.”

The team hosted the Loras open yesterday. The results can be found here.

The team will compete next at the University of Dubuque on April 18th.

Mike Higgins can be reached at michael.higgins@loras.edu

Michael Higgins
Published: March 25, 2009

Atlanta/Orlando – The Loras track and field team made its way down to Orlando, Florida this spring break. The team was able to bond and train under beautiful weather.

“The team, over this week-long trip, really becomes a lot closer and we start meshing more and more as a team,” says jumps and hurdles coach, Geoff Kaiser, “In regards to the training as well, we can do a week’s worth of hard training in good weather and really get ourselves ready for the outdoor season. That puts us at a big advantage to a lot of the other Iowa Conference schools.”

The team’s trip, which involved a track meet at Emory University, was a great overall experience for each individual athlete.

Junior distance runner, Dan Murphy commented, “The training facilities were great, we got to run on the same track as professionals and see what they do every day. The weather was perfect, we couldn’t ask for much more.”

“It’s really a great treat coming off such a cold winter to be able to come down for a whole week and be able to run in 80-degree weather with palm trees around us and to be able to finish off this meet in this type of weather. This is perfect racing conditions and there’s great competition,” said sophomore distance runner, Dain Leytem.

One outstanding performer at the Emory Invite was sophomore, Tara Kilburg, who ran a winning time of four minutes and thirty-nine seconds in the 1500 meter race.

Kilburg stated, “I was really happy with it for my first race. It was a personal record and I almost provisionally qualified for nationals. Just those two things give me a lot of confidence going into the outdoor season.”

Now that the Duhawks are back in Dubuque they will be hosting the Alumni meet this Saturday at the Rock Bowl.

Michael Higgins can be reached at Michael.Higgins@loras.edu

Michael Higgins
Published: March 4, 2009

WAVERLY – The IIAC conference meet was held last weekend at Wartburg College. Both the men and women had high expectations. Coach Schultz commented, “Well for the men I was a little disappointed. We came in hoping to win and it was a great team battle between us, Wartburg and Central all the way to the end. We just came up a few places short.”

There were many outstanding performances both on the men’s and women’s sides, but one individual came up big by scoring the Duhawks a total of 34 points. “Chris Buresh, on the men’s side was through the roof. He qualified for nationals for two events, was conference champion in two events, was All-Conference in a third event, and is going to nationals in the high jump and pole vault,” stated Coach Shultz.

Another conference champion was Brian Westemeier who won the weight throw with a qualifying mark that made him good enough for nationals. His goals for the outdoor season included coming back to Central and beating them in their own place and trying to possibly win the whole conference.

The women’s team met their goals for the indoor season. Schultz said, “The women’s side was great. We were fifth last year and the girls moved to second in a year, and we graduated some good girls last year. The track team will be traveling to Florida this spring break for some warmer training. Their first outdoor meet will be at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia on March 21.

Michael Higgins can be contacted at michael.higgins@loras.edu

Michael Higgins
Published: February 18, 2009

PLATTEVILLE –This past weekend the fifteenth ranked men and the twenty-sixth ranked women track teams were in Platteville, Wisconsin for the Nike Impact Sports Invite.

The Loras Track and Field team may be nearing the finish line of their indoor season, but they are not slowing down, with conference right around the corner several men and women boasted their best marks last Saturday.

Head Coach Bob Shultz was very pleased with his team’s performance.

“I think it was a good meet, I know Brian Westemeier had a personal best in the shot put,” said Shultz.

“Obviously our women did awesome in the distance medley relay qualified for nationals broke the school record third fastest time in the country, Mary Bridget Corken ran an indoor personal best in the half and was first place in that we had a lot of personal bests today so it was a good meet,” said Shultz.

One outstanding middle distance runner on the team is junior, Hannah Weiss.

“My biggest achievement so far would probably be qualifying for the 800 for nationals and also the distance medley relay,” said Weiss

Another member of the Loras track team who is having a stand out season is Barb Kremer, currently ranked fifth in the nation in the fifty five meter hurdles.

“My achievement personally is that I qualified for the national meet which was one of my big goals, another goal was to run an 8.40 and I accomplished that today by running an 8.34,” says Kremer.

With conference only two weeks away Coach Schultz holds high expectations for both the men and women teams.

“Well the way things are looking right now I think both teams will be able to reach their goals, the guys’ goal is to win, I think we got a good shot at that, and the women’s goal is top three and I really think they have a shot at finishing in the top two,” says Schultz.

The Loras track and field team has one last indoor meet down the street at the University of Dubuque this weekend.

SportsZONE will bring you all of the Duhawk’s results after their conference meet at Wartburg on February twenty-seventh and twenty-eighth.

Michael Higgins can be contacted at Michael.Higgins@loras.edu