The men’s track and field team won its first official outdoor meet at the Dusty Lane open last Saturday at Spokane Falls Community College. The overall scoring as a team was 186.83 which placed first at the meet. There were 6 individual wins for Whitworth including senior Frank Lima in high jump (2.0m), junior Tyler Guinn in long jump (6.78m), senior Carter Comito in shot put (18.07m), senior John McCormack in javelin (65.95m) and both the 4×100 relay team (42.4) and the 4×400 relay team (3:29.10).

It was a personal best for Guinn in the long jump.

“I’ve been injured so I was happy I could pull that off,” Guinn said. “I hope to get 23 feet by the end of the season.”

Guinn not only won the long jump but contributed in the winning 4×100 relay team.

“We also have some missing pieces right now with injuries for the relay,” Guinn said. “We ran a 42.4 and hope to get 41 or lower. Our goal is to make it to nationals and be All-Americans.”

Lima grabbed first in the high jump clearing 2 meters.

“Being the second outdoor meet, there wasn’t too much pressure,” Lima said. “We just wanted to win as a team. It’s still a long season and I know there’s much room for improvement.”

The team’s goal was achieved.

“Our goal was to score 160 points and we did that so our team’s performance was really good,” Lima said. “I think this early in the season our efforts were good despite the weather. We had a couple national qualifying marks so our season started off really well.”

Despite an injury, junior Joseph Ingman took second in the javelin behind senior teammate McCormack.

“It was a personal record for me so I was quite happy,” Ingman said. “Last year I was stuck under 200 feet so it was nice to break into the 200’s.”

He also was happy with the team effort last Saturday.

“We have a lot of depth in throws, jumps, and sprints,” Ingman said. “We were competing against [Division I] schools and we came out on top. Collectively we did that and it showed how good we are and our ability to compete with the top teams in the Northwest.”

Contact Tiara Pajimola at [email protected]