Oregon's Sammons Runs NCAA 10K Mark in Stanford Invite

Photo: goducks.com

STANFORD, Calif. - University of Oregon freshman Keara Sammons paced the Duck men’s and women’s distance runners who opened action Friday evening in the first day of the two-day Stanford Invitational, held at Cobb Track and Angell Field on the Stanford University campus.

In the evening finale, the women’s 10,000 meters, Sammons scored UO’s first NCAA women’s provisional mark of the outdoor season (second, 33:54.55) and easily dipped below the NCAA provisional standard of 35:00.00, and was not far off the NCAA automatic mark of 33:33.00.

Sammons’ time moved her to sixth all-time for UO ahead of Liz Wilson (seventh, 34:13.04, 1988), Niamh Zwagerman (eighth, 34:23.15, 1996), Rosa Gutierrez (ninth, 34:27.65, 1983) and Molly Morton (ninth, 34:28.5, 1979).

Sammons ran in a pack of seven runners that ran an even pace the first 6-7 kilometers and split between 80-82 seconds for each lap.

In the final 1 1/2 miles the majority of that peloton group finally caught a pair of early leaders.

With less than a kilometer to go, Sammons had moved up to third place, and continued to pick up her pace the last two laps and nearly made up 20 meters the 400m to finish less than a second shy behind the winner, Arkansas sophomore Denis Bargiachi (first, 33:53.61).

The Centennial, Colo., native Sammons was an NCAA provisional qualifier indoors for the Ducks with her indoor 5,000m personal best (16:31.71) that moved her to third all-time for UO.

Earlier Friday on the women’s side, freshman Zoe Buckman, a recent addition to the women’s middle distance corps, ranked 11th overall in her section of the 800m (2:08.40), and sophomore Zoe Nelson made her 5,000m outdoor season debut (22nd, 17:24.23).

On the men’s side, Duck finishers included redshirt sophomore Chris Winter (5,000m, 25th, 14:36.46) and freshman Ryan Waite (800m, 31st-heat, 1:54.11).

Several Ducks also competed unattached Friday evening, including freshman redshirts Isaac Stoutenburgh (24th-heat, 14:36.46) and Daniel Mercado (14th-heat, 24:26.42).

Complete results are available at the www.GoStanford.com website at the http://www.sml1.com/recordtiming/stanford/stanford_invite07/ URL address.

Looking ahead to Saturday’s second and final day action, several other of UO’s most prominent distance runners – including senior Dana Buchanan, junior Galen Rupp, sophomore Rebekah Noble and freshman Nicole Blood - are entered in the 1,500m, 5,000m and/or 10,000m.

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