April 4, 2007

AUSTIN, Texas - Fourteen members of the Lamar University men's and women's track team will join some of the nation's top professional, collegiate and high school track and field athletes in Austin this week for the 80th running of the Clyde Littlefield Texas Relays at the University of Texas' Mike A. Myers Stadium.

The Cardinal men have two individual competitors, with Michael Gauthier running the 100 meter dash, and Stephen Boone running the 400 meter hurdles. The Cardinals will also run the distance medley relay, with Andy Haeggquist running the 400, Danny Shaw running the 800, Frank Bwambale running the 1,200 and Francis Kasagule running the 1,600.

Gauthier has posted a season-best time of 10.82 seconds in the 100 and Boone has run a season-best of 55.22 in the 400 hurdles. For the men's DMR, Haeggquist has a season-best time of 49.68 in the 400, Shaw has run a 1:54.90 in the 800, Bwambale and Kasagule has the 16th fastest time in the NCAA in the 1,500 meter run, a 3:46.59, which he ran at Rice last weekend.

The Lady Cardinals have three individuals running in the meet as well as teams in the 4x100, 4x400 and the distance medley relays. Sahara Abraham will run the 100 meter dash, Jessika Johnson and Adrianne Johnson and will run the 100 meter hurdles and Alexandria Mayfield will run the 400 meter hurdles.

The Lamar 4x100 team consists of Abraham, Adrianne Johnson, Jessika Johnson and Brittany Pollard; the 4 x 400 team is made up of Adrianne Johnson, Jessika Johnson, Pollard and Mayfield, while the DMR will be run by Pollard (400), Andrea Smith running the 800, Rachel Kingsford running the 1,200 and Amanda King running the 1,600.

The season best times for the individual competitors for the LU women are 12.38 in the 100 meter dash for Abraham, 14.36 in the 100 hurdles for Jessika Johnson and 15.39 for Adrianne Johnson, while Mayfield has a season-best time of 1:03.20 in the 400 hurdles.

Pollard's season-best in the 400 meter dash is 56.55, Smith has posted a 2:16.07 in the 800 and King has run a 4:39.56 in the 1,500.

The first event for Lamar will be the women's 400 meter hurdles at 4:30 p.m. Thursday afternoon followed by the men's 400 hurdles at 5 p.m. On Friday, the day starts with the prelims of the men's and women's 4 x 100 meter relay at 9:30 a.m. followed by the rest of the preliminary races. The women's and men's 4 x 400 relay will conclude the prelims on Friday.

Finals for the running events will begin at 12:15 on Saturday, with the DMR's being run starting at 1:05 p.m.