Delaware Invitational

Horgan Finishes His Illustrious Career With an Undefeated Season as Delaware Wraps Up The 2023 Season On Their Home Track

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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.

Horgan and Latina embracing after their final race together

MacHenry elated by his new personal best in the 1500

Radinsky locking in for the 4×100

The seven seniors who ended their careers after this meet. Left to right: Chris Calandra, Sasha Latina, Jenna Mlecko, Alex Horgan, Madeleine Dorley, John Papadopoulos, Matt Bieker

Women, Men’s Teams Place in the Top Three at Princeton Invitational

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Delaware club cross country ran in its first NIRCA sanctioned race of the season at the Princeton Invitational Sunday. Princeton historically is a longer course and this year it was no different. Despite the slightly longer course, over 14 personal bests were set across the board!

The women led off the afternoon in the 6,000 meter-race with a third place and 87-point performance out of 11 teams. Three senior runners finished inside the top twelve positions for the Blue Hens. Bailey Davin finished sixth with a time of 24:49.47, while Talia Brookstein-Burke and Allison Einig came in eighth and twelfth with finishing times of 25:17.16 and 25:38.84. 

Sophomore Natalie Pinto placed inside the top seven for the first time on the year with a 28:53.14 performance. Freshman Lauren Pollock rounded out the scoring five right behind Pinto in a time of 28:57.55. Junior Kayla Johnson and senior Liz Steenkamer took the final two top seven spots.

Similar to the women, the men finished the day with a third place finish and tallied 91 points in a 12 team field. Junior Alex Horgan headlined the 8,000 meter-race and became the first club cross country runner to win an individual title since Michael Durkin in 2019. Horgan won the race with a time of 25:55.16.

Graduate student Bryant Cordova (27:38.87) and senior Schuyler Reed (28:00.07) took 15th and 24th place. Junior Sasha Latina (28:18.42) and senior Paul Filipow (28:24.71) went back-to-back to finish off the scoring five with 31st and 32nd place finishes. Sophomore Cam Harrington (29:07.56) and junior Chris Calandra (29:26.17) took the final two spots in the top seven.

The team’s second meet of the week is set for Oct. 23 at Lehigh University in NIRCA’s Mid-Atlantic Regional race. Full meet results can be found here.

Alex Horgan pulls away from the field for a first place finish.

Bailey Davin led the way for the women placing sixth.

Four Delaware runners won awards for their top 12 individual performances!

Cross County Returns to the XC Course at Delaware Invitational

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The Delaware club cross country team made its return to White Clay Creek State Park for the first time since September of 2019 in the 2021 Delaware Invitational on Saturday. Full results can be found here.

The women started off the morning with a 57 point, second place finish out of a six team field and placed all of its seven runners in the top 30.

Senior Bailey Davin finished 12th and led the way for the Blue Hens with a time of 25:14. Davin’s time is only five seconds off her 2019 performance of 25:09 at White Clay, which is sixth all-time. Senior Talia Brookstein-Burke ran a course personal best of 26:00.2 and in her first ever college race, sophomore Jenna Mlecko finished 17th with a time of 26:04.2.

Senior Allison Einig and junior Madeleine Dorley rounded out the scoring five for Delaware with times of 26:52.5 and 28:36.7. Sophomore Emily Ward and freshman Lauren Pollock in their college cross country debuts took the final two top seven spots with times of 28:55.5 and 29:37.6.

“It’s a really tough course to start out with, but everybody put in a lot of good work today and we had a lot of great results,” Davin said.

On the men’s side, two runners broke the sub-30 barrier including a top 10 all-time performance by junior and Boston College transfer Alex Horgan. Horgan surpassed Chris Kitson and now sits sixth all-time with his 27:04.8 time. Horgan took second place overall.

Senior Paul Filipow placed 12th and crossed the line second for Delaware with a personal course best of 29:38.5. Senior Schuyler Reed, graduate student Bryant Cordova and junior Sasha Latina all finished in under 31 minutes, with times of 30:25.3, 30:28.5 and 30:45.3 respectively. Sophomore’s Cam Harrington and Daniel Giron rounded out the top seven with their first ever 8k times of 31:15.1 and 31:46.3.

“I really enjoyed the hill mid race, it’s in fact so nice I could do it twice,” Filipow said. “Overall, really proud with the team today, really proud to see what we can do for Princeton, Lehigh and beyond.”

The cross country team will travel to Princeton University on Oct. 17 to race at the Princeton Invitational.