It was a productive weekend for Lions athletes, competing south of the border in New York State headlined by Divya Biswal bounding out to 12.69m to finish third at the Armory Track Invitational in New York City.
Biswal’s leap is the second furthest in club history behind Chantal Ouoba’s club record of 12.74m set in 2002. This was the second top ten performance of the early season for the St. Lawrence University graduate, as Biswal jumped out to 5.85m last month in a meet at Cornell University to move to number six in the long jump.
Upstate, Lions athletes broke a total of five facility records at the Ithaca College Bomber Invitational. Defending USports champion in the 60m hurdles, Devyani Biswal continued to lower her seasonal best as she twice ran under her own facility record on her way to gold on Saturday. She beat her old record of 8.65 seconds, running 8.61 in the semi and 8.56 in the final. She is currently ranked fifth in USports.
In the women’s 400m, grade 11 student Sharelle Samuel dominated the event, crossing the line in a time of 57.64 seconds. The Ashbury student eclipsed former Lion Marisa Turner’s record of 58.23 set last year, winning by over a second.
While both Seb Saville and Madison Clarke dropped under the old 800m facility records, only Clarke got to hold on to the title. She won handily in the women’s race, finishing in 2:13.67, more than a second ahead of her nearest competitor and almost eight tenths under the previous best.
In the men’s race, Saville wasn’t as fortunate. While his time of 1:52.83 was two and a half seconds under the previous record, the Carleton University student would have to settle for third place.
The final record was broken by the University of Ottawa quartet of Jecica Joseph, Charlotte Gardner, Sophia Skorenky and Madison Clarke as they obliterated the previous standard, winning in 3:52.80. Cornell University had previously set the record of 3:57.38 last winter.
Rounding out the weekend’s performances was Melissa Bishop making her 2017 debut at the Camel City Elite 800m in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where she won in 2:02.49. The world championship silver medalist had been gunning for her own meet record, 2:02.10 set last year. Bishop will round out her indoor season next weekend with meets in Ireland and England.
