Men's, women's track set marks at Virginia Tech

The men's and women's track teams took advantage of a fast track and a new event to achieve personal bests over the weekend in Blacksburg, Va. at the Virginia Tech Invitational.

The speed of the track drew many of the country's top teams and afforded Duke the chance to test its mettle against the elite of the NCAA. In this setting, many Blue Devils turned in performances to boost the collective effort.

The men's distance medley relay team made up of Kyle Leonard, Matt Diglio, James Vasak and Mike McKeever placed fifth with a time of 10:03.7. The time well surpassed the IC4A qualifying standard of 10:18.00. By reaching this mark, the runners will be able to participate in the IC4A championships in March. The team is a very young group, as Leonard, Diglio and Vasak are all sophomores and McKeever, a highly touted recruit from New York, is a freshman.

All four of the underclassmen ran well, but McKeever was the man of the hour in the mile portion of the relay. In high school, he was the New York champion in the mile and he had a chance to display his skills to other track programs from around the country during the race.

In his leg of the relay, McKeever caught up with the leaders for the first half of the mile before eventually finishing a respectable fifth with a time of 4:12.9. This time surpassed his previous best of 4:16.22 by nearly four seconds.

"That's the fastest freshman relay leg in a long time at Duke," said associate men's coach Norm Ogilvie.

On the women's side, junior pole vaulter Lisa Bell also performed very well. Women's pole vault is a brand new event this year in NCAA track and field and Bell is the Duke's first-ever women's pole vaulter. She wasted no time in claiming the school record by clearing eight feet last weekend at a meet in Lehigh. This weekend, she again cleared eight feet and is currently ranked fifth in the Atlantic Coast Conference standings.

This coming weekend, Duke will send eight of its best athletes to Boston to compete in the Terrier Classic. The whole team will compete again on Saturday, February 7th against Clemson, James Madison, William and Mary and Virginia Tech.