Tigers top Penn

After kneeing herself in the face while high jumping in the first meet of the season in December, senior Brooke Minor found herself tentative when taking jumps. She was much more cautious and failed to challenge herself by shooting for her best possible height. On Saturday, however, Minor laid those fears to rest, winning the event by tying her personal best jump of five feet, eight inches, and contributing to the women's track team's 72.5-54.5 win over Penn.

The small meet, held at home in Jadwin Gym, gave Princeton a chance to see where it measured against one of its Ivy League rivals. Junior Cack Ferrell took continued her dominance and took first in the mile in 4:53.61. She was followed by senior Carrie Strickland who posted a time of 4:57.58.

For many sophomores, the weekend capped off an exhausting week filled with sign-in and bicker events. The fatigue typically associated with the time did not affect sophomore Catha Mullen, though. She raced to a personal best and a win in the 3,000-meter event in a time of 9:43. The 13-second drop from her previous fastest time in the 3,000m run came just a week after she set a new personal best of 4:52 in the mile last weekend. Mullen characterized her current fitness level as "the best shape of my life."

Other point-scorers for the Tigers included junior Juliette Poussot, who won two tightly contested races, the 60m dash and the 200m dash, and senior Jenn Byrd, who took first place in the 60m hurdles and the long jump. Freshman Marta Pardo won the long jump with a leap of 36 feet, seven and three quarter inches.

Meanwhile, the men's team traveled to State College, Pa. to take on Penn State and Connecticut. The Tigers finished in second place, falling to Penn State, 161-124. Head coach Fred Samara noted that several athletes did not run their best events in order to aid their training, and he estimated that 10 to 12 team members stayed in Princeton due to the flu-.

Freshman Dave Nightingale took advantage of the opportunity to race on one of the fastest tracks in the country, running a 4:08 to take second place in the mile. He significantly bettered the time he recorded last week, 4:10.24, setting the new school record for the fastest indoor mile run by a freshman. Nightingale, whose high school personal best was 4:19, attributed his improvement to an increase in mileage and the chance to run with others at a high level. Next week, he will run the 1,000m in preparation for running the mile at Heptagonals, the Ivy League championships.

At Penn State, junior distance runner Ben Stern posted a time of 8:25 to win the 3,000m. Sophomore Ray Lenihan had a virtual repeat of last week, running an identical time of 8.02 in the 60m hurdles and once again claiming first place. Sophomore Richard Stewart and senior Mike Kopp swept the first two places in the 500m run, while senior Alexis Tingan and sophomore Aaron Reed took second and third in the 800m run.

Stewart's time of 1:02.27 in the 500m — the best recorded in the Ivy League this year — set both a new school and a new meet record. Samara praised Stewart's race and called him a "favorite" at Heps.