Penn, Drake Relays to divide track team

By By Patrick Shehan (Contact)

Friday, April 29, 2005

Sheldon Battle, junior thrower, prepares during the hammer throw competition at the Kansas Relays last week. The track and field team will be competing in the Drake Relays in Des Moines, Iowa, and the Penn Relays in Philadelphia this weekend.

Breaking up is hard to do. Luckily, the KU Track and Field team has to do so for only one weekend.

The team will split squads and travel to Des Moines, Iowa, for the Drake Relays, and Philadelphia for the Penn Relays. Brooklyn Hann, Sheldon Battle and Amy Linnen will lead their half of the team to the Penn Relays. One of the most historic meets in the nation, the Penn Relays will host premier Top 25 teams. On the men’s side, Arkansas, Auburn, and Indiana will take on the Jayhawks. On the women’s side, South Carolina, Stanford and Texas will compete.

The KU women’s track and field team broke into the Top 25 this week with the help from a stellar team effort last week at the Kansas Relays. They are tied for 23rd in the nation, along with Kansas State, Arkansas and Wake Forest. Hann, senior runner, ranks second in the 100-meter hurdles and third in the triple jump. She said she took the time last weekend at the Kansas Relays to rest and practice before the Penn Relays.

“It’s just a good day to relax and jump far,” Hann said. “Hopefully, next week I’ll do better.”

Battle, junior thrower, ranks first in the Big 12 Conference in the men’s shot put. He also ranks second in the discus. Linnen finished second in the pole vault at the Kansas Relays last weekend, but still ranks first in the Big 12.

Abby Emsick, junior thrower from Council Bluffs, Iowa, will travel to the Penn relays with a victory fresh in her mind. She won the women’s discus last weekend at the Kansas Relays with a throw of 168-feet-8.5-inches. Her performance left her ranked fourth in the Big 12.

“I had the choice of going to Drake or Penn, because Drake is my home meet,” Emsick said. “It would have been big to go back home and go to Drake. Penn is the biggest meet of the year, and I’ve never been to that.”

Athletics director Lew Perkins held the position of associate athletics director at the University of Pennsylvania for three and a half years and oversaw the Penn relays.

“The Penn Relays is the premier track event in the nation,” Perkins said. “The Kansas Relays was once equal, but in the last 10 to 15 years, the Penn Relays have passed them.”

Perkins said that the Penn Relays set the standard for collegiate relays in the nation. This is a standard that ever since he arrived at the University of Kansas, he’s been trying to meet.

“One thing we want to get back to is the golden days where the Kansas Relays and the Penn Relays were the two best meets in the country,” he said.

Kim Clark, Aaron Thompson and Ekaterina Sultanova head up the group of the Jayhawks traveling to the Drake Relays. Another premier relay meet, the Drake Relays will feature athletes from Top 25 teams such as Alabama, Georgia and Baylor.

Edited by Kendall Dix

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