NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Another school record fell for the Vanderbilt women’s track and field team. Meanwhile, several other additions were made to the school record book over the weekend at the Music City Challenge inside the Vanderbilt Multipurpose Facility.
Vanderbilt’s sprinters were rewriting the record book again.
Sophomore Madison Fuller set the school record in the 60 meters and won the 200 meters with the second-fastest finish in program history. Junior Taiya Shelby also moved into second place in the school record book with a blazing finish in the 400 meters while freshman Haley Bishop and sophomore Kaira Brown etched their names into Vanderbilt’s history as well.
Fuller broke the school standard set by Bishop less than a month ago with a finish of 7.50. It was one-hundreth faster than Bishop’s record time and earned Fuller the silver in the event. Bishop was two-hundreths behind on Saturday for a third-place finish.
In the 200 meters, Fuller’s time of 24.26 is the best for any Commodore since Ryan Tolbert set the program record 23 years ago (23.99). Bishop moved into fourth place in Vandy history with a runner-up finish of 24.38.
Shelby won the 400 meters with Vanderbilt’s fastest finish in 25 years. Her winning time of 53.42 trails only Tolbert’s school standard of 52.75 set in 1996. Meanwhile, Brown was sixth with a time of 55.73 — eighth-best all-time at Vanderbilt.
Brown, junior Jordan Smith, freshman Nicole Anderson and Shelby each carried the baton in the 4×400 relay, respectively. The foursome finished in 3:40.57 to boast the sixth-best 4×4 in school history and Vandy’s fastest since 2015.
“This group has been a lot of fun,” Vanderbilt assistant coach Donnie Young said of the sprinters. “It’s a blue-collar group. They’ve bought into the training and they’re not afraid to work hard. That’s just the mentality and culture they’ve built together, and that’s why they’re getting the results. The potential is there for some special things as the season progresses.”
Senior Ruby Stauber continued her impressive run up the school record book with a second-place finish of 2:07.29 in the 800 meters. Entering the weekend, that ranks as the seventh-fastest time in the SEC this season, but more impressively, it ranks her second all-time at Vanderbilt.
In Friday’s pentathlon, sophomores Jada Sims and Josephine Dal posted two of the top six scores in school history. Sims finished with the fifth-most points all-time at Vanderbilt with 3,634, while Dal now ranks sixth in program history with 3,504 points.
Sims’ pentathlon was highlighted by her personal-best high jump of 5 feet, 7.25 inches (1.71 meters), which is tied for sixth in school history, while Dal improved her seventh-place standing in the school record book with a career-best 8.79 in the 60-meter hurdles.
“It was nice to see their hard work pay off,” Vanderbilt associate head coach Clark Humphreys said of the pentathletes. “It has been a learning process. We’ve managed some nagging injuries, but we’ve got those under control now, and with consistent training we’ve seen a lot of good signs in practice and competition. We are on the right track and this certainly helps their confidence to know they can be in the mix with SEC competition.
“(Sims) is ready for the next step to score at the conference meet—it’s going to be tough, but it’s attainable. I’m excited for what’s ahead.”
Three Commodores finished under five minutes in the mile while senior Gillian Mortimer was the top Dore in the 5,000 meters (17:03.65) and sophomore Caroline Eck led Vandy in the 3,000 meters (9:52.97). Grace Jensen was Vandy’s top miler at 4:54.69 followed by Annie Gallagher (4:56.44) and Lainey Phelps (4:57.46).
The Music City Challenge was the the final tune-up before the Commodores compete at the SEC Indoor Championships on Feb. 26-27 in Fayetteville, Arkansas.
