Feb. 27, 2009
USAF ACADEMY, Colo. - San Diego State senior Karoline Koehler automatically qualified for the NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships, set a school record and emerged with the long jump title on Friday at the Mountain West Conference Indoor Championships at the Air Force Academy. The senior also qualified for the finals of the 60- and 200-meter dash on a day where eight personal records and 10 season bests were established.
Koehler won the long jump with a lifetime-best leap of 20 feet, 10.75 inches to win the competition. She also broke her own school record set at last year's Championships by 7.75 inches, had the second-best performance in the history of the meet and became the first Aztec to win the event in the 10-year history of the league. Prior to the long jump, Koehler qualified for the finals of the 60 with a personal-record time of 7.41 to post the second-best time in program history and the second-fastest mark in the field. Additionally, she enters the 60 final just .01 second shy of provisionally qualifying for nationals. Later in the 200, Koehler punched her ticket to Saturday's championship round with personal-best time of 24.54, which was good for fifth at the meet and seventh in school history.
In the 60 hurdles, Annimari Korte and Briana Johnson secured spots in the finals with their top-7 finishes. Korte, a freshman, finished in fifth place with a personal-record time of 8.61 and entered the Aztec all-time performance list at No. 7. Johnson, meanwhile, came in seventh in the preliminaries after crossing the finish line in 8.65.
Junior co-team captain Nicole Stone also qualified for Saturday's final in the 400-meter dash by coming in fourth place with a season-best time of 56.61.
In the 800, San Diego State had each of its runners record PRs in Amy Brown and Leigh Rutherford. The cross country teammates posted times of 2:25.25 and 2:28.28, respectively. Fellow harrier, Alma Escobar, also turned in a solid effort by completing the 5,000-meter run in 20:14.52 to turn in the fourth-best time in school history.
Other Aztecs to enjoy lifetime-best efforts were Maria Rodriguez in the weight throw (47-11.25) and Thoraya Maronsey in the long jump (17-2.25).
Those who posted season-best performances include pole vaulters Katie Vo (11-6.50) and Dana Jensen (11-6.50), Jessika Hornsby in the 60 (7.71) and the 200 (25.02), Shana Solomon in the 60 (7.77), Decontee Kaye in the 200 (25.28) and in the long jump (19-11.75) and Shana Watson in the long jump (18-5.00).
In the team standings, San Diego State finds itself in eighth place with 14 points behind BYU (83 points), Utah (32), Air Force (24), TCU (23), Colorado State (21), New Mexico (19) and Wyoming (15). UNLV is in ninth place with three points. Historically, SDSU has scored a majority of its points on the final day of action and will, again, have the same opportunity on Saturday.
Final day action begins for the Aztecs at 10 a.m. MT with the trials and finals of the triple jump.