Pride earn third place finish at opening indoor meet of 2022-23

DAVENPORT, Iowa - Getting their 2022-23 season started at the St. Ambrose hosted Finals Week Invite and Multi, the Clarke University women's track and field team put together a strong team performance capping off a third place finish on Saturday.

The Pride earned some personal records for their returners and impressive first marks from their freshmen competitors as they posted multiple top five event finishes.

Sophomores Emma Grant and Marlie Beauchem top prior marks at Clarke with Grant setting a new PR in the 60-meter dash with a preliminary time of 8.44 to qualify for the finals but did not start the finals due to event overlap. Grant also set a new personal best in the long jump with a 4.88-meter jump to finish in ninth place as Beauchem topped her best mark in the weight throw to finish in fourth place with a 13.10-meter throw.

Freshman thrower Royal Hart was the only member of Clarke's women's throwing squad to participate in both the weight throw and shot put as the Antioch, Calif. natvie finished fourth in the shot put with a 11.77-meter best throw and finished between Beauchem and Samantha Kane in the weight throw as Hart threw a 13.01-meter best and Kane finished with a 12.78-meter top throw.

CU had a strong group of freshmen competing in their first collegiate event led by Grace Squires with the highest finish of any member of the Pride, earning a second place in the pole vault with a 3.31, only losing out to an unattached competitor. Squires also ran in the 60-meter dash to finish with a time of 8.75 seconds for the 14th-best time in qualifying.

Along with Squires and Grant in the pole vault were freshmen Autumn McLaughlin and Malia Beich with McLaughlin finishing in sixth place at 2.86 meters and Beich right behind at 2.71 meters and seventh place as Beich also ran in the 60-meter dash for a 8.86 first race of her collegiate career.

Anya Ranson and Isabelle Matthews both competed for the Pride in the pentathlon as freshman with Ranson earning 2388 total points for a fourth place finish and Matthews earning 2059 points in sixth. Ranson was the anchor leg of the Pride's 4x400 meter relay team that finished in fourth place as she combined with Emma Terwische, Sydney Norman, and Gwen Bottom for a 4:26.86 time.

Terwsiche, Norman, Bottom, and Ranson were also part of a group of jumpers for Clarke along with Matthews and Grant as the high jumpers of Norman (1.50m), Matthews (1.45m), Ranson (1.40m), and Bottom (1.40m) combined to score seven team points for CU and the Emmas that long jumped finished for a combined four team points for the Pride with Terwische finishing with a 4.77-meter best jump.

In the 3000-meter run, Jaycie Franco finished with a time of 11:21.59 as she finished less than a second behind teammate Rory Bickler's 11:20.87 as the combination of Bickler and Franco both came off of a strong cross country season where they were Clarke's one-two for most of the year.

This was Clarke track and field's lone event of the indoor season to take place before the calendar turns to 2023 as they'll be back on the track following their break for a trip to Waverly, Iowa to compete in the Chelsey Henkenius Open on Jan. 14.