For their final meet of the season, the Delaware Club Track & Field team journeyed to their very own Grant Stadium for the Delaware Invitational. The club team was able to compete at their own campus for the first time since 2018 thanks to this meet, which was hosted by University of Delaware’s Women’s Division I Track & Field team. Unfortunately, the bad weather theme continued for the Blue Hens, with rain falling for the entirety of the contest. But per usual, the squad faced the elements and dropped some heat on the track.

The wettest meet of the season started with the wettest event, the 3,000-meter steeplechase. The water clearly didn’t bother the Blue Hens because two of them smashed their personal bests by 30-plus seconds. Freshman Kaitlyn Burke continued her steeplechase progression by dropping a 12:54.38-second run to place 4th overall in the meet and move up to 4th on the all-time performance list, passing Kendra Cutler’s time from 2019. Senior Jenna Mlecko followed Burke in 5th place at 13:00.83. Mlecko ended her collegiate steeple career with a 36-second improvement on her personal best, which also moved her above Cutler on the performance list.

Despite a very quick turnaround, the duo of Burke and Mlecko also put in great work in the 1500-meter race. The girls placed back-to-back once again, with Burke (5:36.77) and Mlecko (5:37.93) placing 9th and 10th respectively. On the men’s side, senior Alex Horgan once again came out on top, running 4:00.01 in his final 1500 of his collegiate career. Fellow senior Sasha Latina also placed in the top-5 in his final collegiate 1500, his 4:22.21 was good for 4th place overall. Michael Toy (4:24.29) and Caden MacHenry (4:37.61) placed 6th and 7th respectively, and both set new personal bests.

The women’s 4×100 has had a rotation of a few different faces for Delaware, and for the third time this year, a new squad added themselves to the performance list. The group consisting of Sam Radinsky, Gianna Dowling, Grace Wertheimer, Lianna Greenstein added their names to the outdoor performance list at 6th place, and their 57.42-second relay was good for 3rd place at the meet. In the open 100-meter dash, Delaware’s club team took the top two spots in the men’s event. Freshmen DJ Seals (11.71) and Kurt Krummenacker (11.77) took first and second place overall, and Seals’ 0.01-second improvement on his collegiate best was good enough to separate himself from Brandon Lichtenstein to move up to 8th all-time in the club’s history. The freshman duo of Seals and Krummenacker also took podium spots in the 200-meter dash. Seals once again won the event with a time of 23.92, and this race tied Brandon Farzad for 8th all-time in club history. Krummenacker landed in third place at 24.47.

The mid-distance events featured a couple of victories from Blue Hens on the men’s side, all of whom making their season debuts. In the 400-meter race, junior Cam Harrington debuted his season with the 10th fastest outdoor time in club history. Harrington’s 52.81-second race was just enough to hold off the competition to give him the win by just under 0.3 seconds, and edged out Brett Tielman-Fenelus’ time from 2013 by 0.01 seconds to land on the outdoor performance list. Freshman Dave Kelly came out of nowhere to win the 800-meter dash at 2:08.60 to start his college career. Junior Riley McAvinue (1:03.46) didn’t just make his season debut, but his collegiate debut on the track with a win in the 400-meter hurdle race. McAvinue’s time was also good enough to land him at 6th all-time on the outdoor performance list.

The men’s 5k wrapped up the meet in glorious fashion, with the top four spots being owned by members of Delaware’s Track Club. Alex Horgan ended his college track career with an undefeated record in individual events this season. Horgan took his 8th straight victory and broke the 15-minute mark for the second time, running 14:56.08. Senior Chris Clandra (16:54.34) also finished his collegiate track career with a podium finish, coming in 3rd. High school teammates Aravind Arunachalam and Jack Pelczar finished their seasons with a pair of personal bests. Arunachalam finished second in 16:33.63, and Pelczar (16:56.12) broke the 17-minute mark for the first time ever to place 4th.

Full meet results can be found here.