HUDDLESTON, Va. - Five athletes placed in the top-50 individually to earn the Navy women's triathlon team sixth place of 20 teams at the NCAA East Regional Qualifier on Saturday at Smith Mountain Lake State Park in Huddleston, Va.
The Mids scored 447 points as a team to finish one spot above their regional preseed. Queens claimed the team title with 560 points.
The race featured a 750m swim, a 20.0 km (12.4 mile) bike and a 5k (3.1 mile) run.
Navy will await further results to determine its qualification for the NCAA National Championship. The national championship is scheduled for Saturday, Nov. 11 in Tempe, Ariz.
"Today was another positive step for the team. We came in seeded seventh and moved ourselves up past another strong program. In our first year, we now find ourselves racing right behind established schools," said head coach
Billy Edwards. "Individually we had our best combined performance by starting off with solid swims. We maintained progress on the bike and finished with nearly all of our athletes moving up on the run."
In a field of 117 athletes,
Haley Harris showed she's one of the best in the region. The junior clocked in a time of 59:56 to finish in 13th place. Her effort scored the Mids 105 points. Harris posted the ninth-fastest run time of the meet at 18:27. The St. John's, Fla., native also compiled a swim time of 10:17 and a bike time of 29:14. Her swim and bike times ranked 16th and 20th in the field, respectively.
Sara Jarman also garnered a top-25 finish. Her time of 1:01:03.3 earned her 23rd place to total 95-points scored for Navy. Jarman ended with the 19th-fastest swim (10:20) and 22nd-best bike (29:19) times. She capped off the event with the 33rd-fastest run time at 19:46.
Emely Vela made a huge jump in the standings to finish 31st overall. Her placement contributed 89 points toward the team score. Vela posted a time of 1:01:41.3 thanks to a strong run segment. The Chester, Md., native compiled the 23rd-best run time at 19:19 to end her great outing.
Anna Wekluk (1:03:17.4) crossed the finish line a few minutes later to take 42nd place and score 81 points. She was one of the top swimmers in the competition, finishing with the seventh-fastest time at 10:08. She also claimed the 24th-best bike time at 29:25.
Madeline Klippenstein added the final 77 points for the Mids with a 47th-place effort at 1:03:53.6. She posted a time of 20:21 during the 5k for her best-ranked portion of the race (48th).
Zoe Adama wrapped up the competition for Navy with a 56th-place finish. She compiled an overall time of 1:05:27.4.
