April 27, 2018
PHILADELPHIA – After just missing an attempt to break the school 4×1,500-meter relay record Friday, a quartet of Vanderbilt middle distance runners will return to the Penn Relays Saturday to chase another Commodore relay mark.
The foursome of Ginger Hutton, Reagan Bustamante, Maddie Criscione and Kendall Derry finished fourth overall in the Championship of America Invitational 4×1,500-meter relay with a time of 18:07.20. It marks the second-fastest clocking ever by a Commodore unit at the distance, bettered only by an 18:04.85 performance at the 2012 Colonial Relays in Williamsburg, Va.
Hutton, Bustamante, Derry and Courtney Clayton are expected to return Saturday to compete in the 4×800-meter relay.
Though the 4×1,500-meter relay did not claim a record, Vanderbilt head coach Steve Keith was proud of the performance by his foursome.
“It was an exciting race and our girls really gave great effort to earn fourth place,” Keith said. “While we didn’t get the record, we wanted to beat some good teams and that’s what we did.”
Hutton opened the relay with a 4:34 1,500-meter split, handing off to Bustamante in a pack that included Eastern Michigan, Georgetown, Penn State and Georgia Tech behind front-runners from Indiana and Villanova.
Bustamante, currently in the best competitive form of her collegiate career, produced a 4:24 leg to pass the baton to Criscione in fifth place. After Criscione’s third split of 4:37, Derry closed the relay impressively with a 4:32 effort, overtaking the Georgetown anchor in the final 200 meters to secure a fourth-place team finish.
On Saturday, Clayton joins Hutton, Bustamante and Derry trying to break the team’s 4×800-meter relay record. The existing team standard of 8:38.34 was established last year at the Tennessee Relays.
Bustamante, Hutton and Derry will enter the reace after setting individual 800-meter personal records last weekend of 2:06.22, 2:10.57 and 2:10.73, respectively. They will be joined by Clayton, an 800-meter All-American last year who clocked 2:09.50 last week at Auburn in her first competition of the outdoor season.
Penn Relays Results
4×1,500-meter relay – 4. Vanderbilt (G. Hutton, R. Bustamante, M. Criscione, K. Derry) 18:07.20
