NASHVILLE, Tenn. – The Vanderbilt track and field team celebrated senior day with six first-place finishes and several improvements in the all-time standings on the final day of the Outdoor Music City Challenge.
“This weekend was a great weekend to be a Commodore,” said Althea Thomas, director of cross country and track and field. “We had the opportunity to run our last regular season meet of the year in front of our home crowd and showcase all of our hard work over the last eight months. We honored our seniors for the hard work, dedication, and commitment for completing a great chapter in their lives. We had several personal bests, top-10 program list improvements and in SEC rankings.”
The Commodores commenced Saturday with Laine Roberts (3.40 meters) and Kaitlyn Deutsch (3.20 meters) in the pole vault.
At noon Vandy honored their seniors across men’s and women’s cross country and women’s track and field.
“Divine’s discus throw bettered her school record and propelled her to the top ranking in the conference,” Thomas said. “She continuously represents Vanderbilt with grace and impressive dominance. Grace’s 800 meter personal best was an improvement in the top-10 list, the SEC, and NCAA west region list. Our 1-2 performance in the 200 meters with Haley and Taiya, shows we sprint at Vandy and we sprint well. Haley was the lone Commodore to win three events – 200, 4×100 meter relay, and 100.”
The first track event of the day for the Dores was the 4×100 meter relay. Nicole Anderson, Madison Fuller, Haley Bishop, and Taiya Shelby took first-place with a time of 45.18.
Josephine Dal raced into the record book with a 13.97 finish in the 100 meter hurdles, taking fifth overall. Dal’s time is now fourth all-time in school history. She also competed in the 400 meter hurdles later in the day with a time of 1:03.79.
Finishing in the top-10 and notching a personal best, was Anderson at 57.48 in the 400 meter dash.
Bishop cruised to the finish line at 11.23 in the 100 meters, with a gold finish.
Vanderbilt raced six in the 800 meters and was led by Grace Jensen‘s second-place time of 2:05.91. This time is a personal best for Jensen and now sixth all-time in the event. Caroline Eck (2:13.12) and Cameron Fawcett (2:15.98) both competed in the event for the first time in their careers. Several other Dores notched personal bests in Julia Rosenberg (2:11.70), Kaira Brown (2:13.56), and Jess Creedon (2:27.88).
In the men’s 800, Lucas Mowery (2:09.98) competed for Vandy.
Divine Oladipo competed alongside Olympians in the shot put and finished in second-place at 17.12 meters.
Paced by his teammates, Jonah Bird‘s bronze finish came at a time of 15:14.20 in the men’s 5,000 meters.
The 4×400 meter relay team of Brown, Anderson, Rosenberg, and Jensen concluded the meet for the Commodores at 3:49.30.
“The performances of Niki and Nick in the 3,000 meters were not only program changing but their boldness to go for greatness really empowered the team to reach for the stars,” said Thomas. “The entire team anchored down and put us in position to go to SEC’s in two weeks and shift the narrative. We are looking forward to the opportunity.”
Vanderbilt will travel to Oxford, Mississippi for the Outdoor SEC Championships on May 12 – 14.
