Colwick's vaults lead men's track

By Brody Rollins     3/27/08 7:00pm

Despite coming up short during the indoor season, the men's track and field team was in midseason form at the first meet of the outdoor season last weekend. Four Owls posted NCAA regional qualifying marks, one fewer than the total number of athletes that were able to do so all of the last outdoor season.The team competes again this Friday and Saturday at the Victor Lopez Bayou Classic, the first meet of the year at the Rice Track/Soccer Stadium. Notable visiting teams include Harvard Univeristy and the University of Texas, which is currently ranked ninth in the nation.

While the rest of the runners traveled across town to the campus of Texas Southern University for the TSU Relays last week, the vaulters headed to the University of Texas to compete in the Texas Invitational. As it turned out, the cool Austin air was just what sophomore Jason Colwick needed as he vaulted a personal best mark of 17 feet, 6.5 inches en route to a tie for first place. This marks the second week in a row that Colwick has had a notable vault - he and freshman Shea Kearney tied Rice's indoor record three weeks ago with vaults of 17-3 at the Arkansas Last Chance meet. Colwick was honored for his efforts this weekend with his first ever Conference USA Track and Field Athlete of the Week mention.

If Colwick is able to break the vaulting record of 18-0.25 this spring, he will have broken one of the most venerable records in all of Rice athletics. The current record-holder, Dave Roberts (Will Rice '73), won the NCAA championships every year from 1971-'73. Roberts then went on to win the bronze metal at the 1976 Olympic Games in Montreal.

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At the TSU Relays, senior Bubba Heard also posted a breakout performance, clocking a time of 46.92 seconds in the 400 meter sprint. The time was good enough for first place and was nearly two seconds faster than his entry time from his freshman year, in addition to being a regional qualifying mark for the NCAA championships. With the result, Heard became the first Rice runner in the last 12 years to break 47 seconds. To make the achievement even more impressive, the former football player was running the event for the first time in four years, with his absence mostly due to schedule conflicts arising from spring football.

"He's always been a 400 runner in our minds," coach Jon Warren (Jones '88) said. "This is the culmination of a very talented and hard-working athlete who has been able to stay out here for eight weeks for the first time in his career. He has never before been able to put together more than four weeks of training for track."

The vaulters were not the only ones to have success in the air. Senior Omar Wright obtained his regional qualifying mark in the high jump with a leap of 6-10.75, which garnered him third place. Freshman Ugo Nduaguba, the Massachusetts state record-holder in the triple jump, won the event with a regional qualifying jump of 49-11.75, improving on his first result of the year by a full foot.

The other winners from this weekend were freshman Clay Baker, who placed first in the collegiate division of the shot put with a throw of 51-5.75, second overall behind assistant coach Luke Stadel.

At one point in the meet, freshman William Meyer held the Rice record in the hammer throw for just over 15 minutes until Baker's fourth-place throw of 155-5 took it away.

Rounding out the other top finishes for the Owls, freshman Michael Trejo finished first in the 3000 with a time of 8:44.50.

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