Utah State Track & Field Competes at MW Indoor Championships This Weekend

Utah State’s [University] track and field teams open competition in the 2016 Mountain West Indoor Championships Thursday [Feb. 25, 2016] with the multi-events kicking things off.

The three-day meet will be held at the Albuquerque Convention Center.

“The mindset going into the conference championship is really just being grateful for the opportunities that we all have had,” said senior thrower Maci Bingham. “People don’t realize how much of a dream it is for a lot of kids to be in college athletics. Especially being a senior, I’m definitely getting the sense of being grateful for everything, so I’m just going to go in with a clear mind. I know our team is going to do well and we’ve all done pretty well this indoor season.”

The athletes to finish each event in the top three will garner first-team all-Mountain West honors. In addition to that, qualifying athletes will head to Birmingham, Alabama, to compete in the NCAA Indoor Championships Friday and Saturday, March 11 and 12.

“Everybody is really on top of their game,” said senior thrower Kevin Allen. “Everybody knows that it is conference and everybody is going to try to perform to the best of their ability. Everything is on the line when it’s conference.”

Real-time scoring and results, along with post-race interviews, event highlights and photo galleries from the Indoor Championships will be available on the championship central page of http://www.themw.com/#!/page/championship_c-itrack. In addition to that, the events on Friday and Saturday will be broadcast live on the Mountain West Network. Fans can watch those events at http://www.themw.com/#!/watch-live.

This is the second consecutive season that the MW Indoor Championships have been held in Albuquerque. In 2015, the Aggie men placed fourth and the women took sixth. Senior Nic Bowens, who is redshirting this indoor season, and Chari Hawkins were named the Men’s and Women’s Outstanding Performers of the Meet, respectively.

In Utah State’s inaugural season in the MW, the Aggie men finished fourth and the women sixth at the 2014 Indoor Championships, which were held in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

“Knock on wood, we’re as healthy as I’ve seen us all year,” veteran head coach Gregg Gensel said. “The kids are really excited about this championship. On the women’s side we’re young, but we have a lot of good individuals and a lot of young people that will get good experience by competing here. On the men’s side, the team believes we can do something special here if we have a great meet and I agree with them. I expect a great, hard-fought meet and it will be exciting to watch.”

The New Mexico men have captured two straight MW Indoor Championships, while the Lobo women also won the team title in 2015, ending San Diego State’s two-year reign at the top of the podium.

Utah State returns four athletes with indoor titles in seniors Parker Bluth (4x400m), Tanner Hunt (4x400m), Cole Lambourne (400m, 4x400m), and sophomore Clay Lambourne (800m, 4x400m).

Bluth has set two school records during the 2016 indoor season. The native of Riverton, Utah, eclipsed Bowens’ mark of 20.80 seconds in the 200m when he crossed the finish line in 20.73 to place second at the New Mexico Team Challenge on Jan. 30. He was also part of the 4x400m relay team, along with the Lambourne brothers and sophomore Brady Martin that finished second at the UNM Team Challenge with a school-best time of 3:08.89.

Bluth currently ranks first in the MW in the 200m (20.80 converted), second in the 60m (6.76 converted) and fourth in the 400m (47.96 converted). He is also part of Utah State’s 4x400m relay team that ranks first in the MW and 28th in the nation (3:09.33 converted).

Cole Lambourne ranks first in the MW in the 400m (47.16 converted), while Martin is second (47.18 converted). Lambourne also ranks eighth in the 200m (21.84) and is part of Utah State’s 4x400m relay team that ranks first in the conference.

“Conference is always exciting,” Cole Lambourne said. “We have a good sprint group, like we do every year, so I’m hoping we can take every sprint event. Our relay team is strong and should do well, but some of the other events we’ll have to fight a little bit harder for.”

Clay Lambourne ranks first in the MW in the 800m (1:50.81) and is part of Utah State’s 4x400m relay team that is first. He also ranks 13th in the 400m (48.84) and is a member of the 4,000m distance medley relay team that ranks second (10:22.14).

The Aggie men have several other athletes that rank in the top three in different events, including junior Jason Allred, who is third in the pole vault (5.02m/16-5.5).

“Right now, I’m sitting third in the conference behind a couple of kids from Air Force who have been jumping really well,” Allred said. “The rest of my group, I’m the captain of the jumpers, so we’ve got (freshman) Leaugen (Fray), who is a favorite to place in the long, high and triple. He’ll do well in those. He’s fighting some injuries, but he’s come back really strong from it. We’ve also got (freshman) Chase Thurgood, who should do pretty well in the long jump.”

On the women’s side, Bingham ranks second in the MW in the weight throw (18.92m/62-01) and third in the shot put (14.66m/48-1.25). She has placed first in the shot put once this season and has four top-three finishes in the weight throw.

Sophomore Olivia Moriconi ranks second in the MW in the shot put (14.94m/49-0.25), while freshman Brenn Flint ranks sixth in the event (14.45m/47-5), giving the Aggies three athletes ranked in the top six.

“I’m really proud of the team this year, especially for me, where I’ve gotten to know a lot of people on the team,” Bingham said. “We’ve become more unified and that has really made all the difference as far as performance goes because when everybody knows there is a huge support system behind them, not just personally, but as a team, they do better. As a team, we’ve definitely done better because of that.”

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