Jan. 25, 2003

Final Stats

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - The University of Illinois women's track and field team may consider staying in Utah a bit longer after the performances turned in Saturday evening at the Olympic Oval Invitational in Salt Lake City.

Perdita Felicien, Chequetta Bearfield and Nicole Whitman all earned victories on Saturday, but it was the manner in which each earned those wins that may extended their 2003 indoor campaign by one meet, the NCAA Indoor National Championships.

Perdita Felicien opened Illinois' fantastic evening by running an automatic-qualifying time of 7.95 seconds to win the 60 meter hurdles (.02 seconds will be added later to each time for an altitude adjustment). In addition to being the the second-fastest time ever clocked by Felicien, the performance established a new Olympic Oval facility record and is the fastest hurdle time run in the world this year.

"I thought I had a slow reaction time, so I was kind of shocked with the time," Felicien said. "It's great to get this season started out with such a great time. I was really determined this week after not finishing they way I would have like to last week, so it was easy for me to get motivated for this race." In earning the win, Felicien out-dueled former BYU standout Tiffany Lott-Hogan, who is the World Indoor Record Holder in the 55 meter hurdles. Lott-Hogan finished second behind Felicien.

The Illinois sprinting success was echoed by senior Chequetta Bearfield who continues remained dominant in the short sprints. After running a career-best time of 7.38 seconds at last weekend's Illinois Invitational, the former Burke High School standout turned in a career-best time of 7.30 seconds to win the 60 meter dash and provisionally qualify for the NCAA Championships. That time by Bearfield, which will be adjusted to 7.32 seconds because of altitude, will tie her with Lauryn Williams of Miami (Fla.) for the fastest time run by a collegian this season and is the third fastest 60-meter time in school history.

"Chequetta has been running great lately," head coach Gary Winckler said. "She's starting to do the things that we knew she was capable of. She just ran two great races today."

Not to be outdone, senior Nicole Whitman won the triple jump with a career-best leap of 42'04.00". In addition to being a provisionally-qualifying performance, that jump is the second-longest leap in Illinois history trailing only Dawn Riley's leap of 43'06.00" in 1996 and is the fifth longest jump in the NCAA ranks this season.

"Nicole had a great day," Winckler said. "She had personal bests in the triple jump and the 60 meters despite having a rough start in her 60-meter race. I really think she is going to get even better in the sprints as the season goes along. This was really just a good meet for us."