NASHVILLE, Tenn. — For the third weekend in a row, the Vanderbilt women’s track and field team will hit the road as it travels to compete in the Mt. SAC Relays, hosted by Nike, in Walnut, California, from Wednesday to Saturday.
The Commodores will be bringing a group of 12 athletes to Walnut: freshmen Mya Georgiadis, Taylor McKinnon and Allyria McBride, sophomores Ella Escobar and Rondajai Washington, seniors Kaira Brown, Caroline Eck, Madison Fuller and Niki Narayani, and graduate students Beatrice Juskeviciute, Brooke Overholt and Taiya Shelby.
For the first time this outdoor season, Shelby will compete in the 400 meters. A three-time All-American in this event, indoors and outdoors, Shelby competed in the 400 meters at last year’s Toyota USATF Outdoor Championships, finishing 16th in the semifinals with a time of 52.40 seconds. Two weeks ago, at the Pepsi Florida Relays, she broke the school record in the 800 meters with a time of 2:03.89. Shelby ranks third in the SEC and seventh in the NCAA at this point in the season.
Juskeviciute will compete in the heptathlon for the first time this season. During the indoor season, she was a silver medalist at the SEC championships (4,271 points) and finished in sixth place at the NCAA championships (4,282 points) in the pentathlon. She reset the Vanderbilt record three times over the course of one indoor season. At Cornell, Juskeviciute was a two-time All-American in the heptathlon and won the conference title twice, in 2019 and 2022.
McBride, Georgiadis and Overholt are scheduled to compete in the 400-meter hurdles at this weekend’s competition. McBride is the top-ranked freshman and eighth overall in the SEC in the event with a time of 57.88 seconds at the Pepsi Florida Relays. McBride and Georgiadis (59.61 seconds) rank fourth and seventh, respectively, all-time in Vanderbilt history. Overholt was named an All-American in the 400-meter hurdles in 2021. This will be her first time competing in the event this outdoor season.
McKinnon will compete in the 100-meter hurdles. She is No. 4 on the Vanderbilt’s top 10 list in the event (13.73 seconds). Last weekend at the Joe Walker Invitational, McKinnon earned fifth place with a time of 13.75 seconds.
Washington and Brown rank in the Vanderbilt outdoor top 10 in their respective sprint events. Washington is fifth in the 200 meters (24.02 seconds), and Brown is fourth in the 400 meters (54.04 seconds). Both Dores will compete on Friday in Walnut.
For the first time this outdoor season, Eck plans to compete in the 5,000 meters. She ranks fourth on the program’s indoor top 10 list for the 5,000 meters with a time of 16:29.82.
Narayani will run the 10,000 meters for the first time in her collegiate career on Thursday. She is an All-Region women’s cross country athlete, holds the school record in the indoor 3,000 meters (9:18.66) and ranks in the program top 10 in the indoor (16:17.82) and outdoor 5,000 meters (16:22.71) and outdoor 3,000 meters (9:36.70).
Two Commodore relay teams will be competing in the Mt. SAC Relays, the 4×100- and 4×400-meter relays. All the athletes competing on these teams are ranked in the Vanderbilt top 10, though in different relay combinations.
The Mt. SAC Relays will kick off on Wednesday at 1 p.m. CT when Juskeviciute competes in the heptathlon 100-meter hurdles.
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