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VT Challenge
February 15-16, 2013
Rector Field House
Blacksburg, Va.
Live Results: http://www.flashresults.com/2013_Meets/indoor/02-15-VTChallenge/

Previewing the meet
• Eighteen schools will be represented at this weekend’s VT Challenge held at Rector Field House. Friday’s action starts at 5 p.m., and will resume Saturday at 11 a.m.
• Schools with entries in the meet include Bowie State, Concord, Cumberlands, Duke, Elon, George Mason, James Madison, Lee University, Liberty, Radford, Roanoke, St. Augustine’s, UNC Wilmington, Wake Forest, Washington & Lee, Virginia Tech, William & Mary and Winston-Salem State.
• The men from Virginia Tech (No. 17) and George Mason (No. 22) are the lone Division I ranked teams in the field. The
• The St. Augustine’s men’s team is the top ranked team in Division II, while Roanoke’s women are ranked No. 20 in Division III.

Last time out
• The Hokies captured four individual wins and 17 top-five finishes at last weekend’s “Doc” Hale VT Elite Meet.
• The weekend was highlighted by Martina Schultze win in the pole vault. The sophomore from Uhingen, Germany broke Victoria von Eynatten’s school record on her first attempt at 14-4.5 (4.38m). She now possesses both indoor and outdoor pole vault records at Virginia Tech. This was her third win in a row this season as she has progressively increased her top season make at each meet.
• Other wins during the weekend came from Sarah Rapp in the who won the 3000 meters in 4:59.44, just outpacing teammate Paige Kvartunas. Alexander Ziegler earned his second win of the season in the weight throw with a season-best toss of 71-7.5 (21.81m), which ranks second nationally, while teammtes Tomas Kruzliak and Denis Mahmic finished fourth and fifth. Jonathan McCants capped off the first night of action in Blacksburg by winning the 200 meters, clocking in with a personal-best time of 21.31.
• Out in the Pacific Northwest, Will Mulherin, Thomas Curtin and Ryan Hagen each left Seattle with new personal records, in Mulherin’s case, a new school record.
• Mulherin re-broke his school record in the 3000 meters with a time of 7:55.64.
• Curtin jumped to second all-time in school history in the 5000 meters after finishing in second at 14:02.73. Hagen is now fourth on the all-time mile list after posting a time of 4:03.85.

Record Breakers
• Combined, the men’s and women’s teams have broken four school records this season.
• Jeff Artis-Gray (60m hurdles) and Jonathan McCants (200m) each reset their school records on the first weekend of action at the VT Invitational.
• A week later, Ronnie Black topped his previous record in the high jump.
• Last weekend, Will Mulherin reset his 3000-meter record, while Martina Schultze broke Victoria von Eynatten’s record in the pole vault which was set last year.

Throwing at the top
• With a runner-up finish in 2011 and a pair of third-place finishes at nationals in the weight throw, Alexander Ziegler opened up his final season at the Hokie Invitational by setting the nation’s standard. His heave of 70-9.25 (21.57m) was more than a foot further than the next best mark in the NCAA. Still, the throw was nearly five feet short of his personal best of 75-7.25 (23.04m).
• A week later, he upped his season-best mark to 71-7.5 (21.83m)which currently ranked second in the NCAA behind Brandon Pounds of Indiana State.

Jumping to new heights
• Already in possession of Tech’s indoor and outdoor high jump records, Ronnie Black has no where to go but up, distancing himself from the others on the list. The senior did just that on Jan. 26, increasing his record two more inches to 7-4.25 (2.24m).

Vaulting into the record books
• Two-time All-American Martina Schultze has won three straight pole vault competitions this year, topping out at a school-record mark of 14-4.5 (4.38m) on her first attempt at the VT Elite Meet. The sophomore’s vault currently ranks as the third best in the country.

Distancing themselves from history
• With Ryan Hagen’s addition to the school’s top 10 list in the 3000m, the current Hokies roster boasts all but three of the top times.
• Will Mulherin owns the school record at 7:55.64, more than 10 seconds clear of second . Michael Hammond, Thomas Curtin, Brayden Burleigh, Leoule Degfae, Jared Berman and Hagen are all within six seconds of one another.
• Mulherin reset his school record at the Husky Classic on Feb. 9.

Quick learning curve
• Despite never having competed in the weight throw prior to coming to Tech from Slovakia, Tomas Kruzliak heaved the 35-lb. weight just over 65 feet it his first competition. He has since eclipsed 67 feet to rank 15th nationally.

Record-breaking start
• Seniors Jeff Artis-Gray and Jonathan McCants opened up their seasons at VT Invitational by topping their already school record marks in the 60m hurdles and 300m.
• After finishing his prelim in the 60m hurdles in 7.87, Artis-Gray shaved a tenth of a second off of his time in the finals to come in at 7.77, 0.04 seconds faster than the school record he set at the VT Elite Meet in 2012.
• Jonathan McCants capped off night one of the VT Invitational by clocking a time of 33.58 in the 300m, nearly five tenths of second faster than his previous school record of 34.05 which he set at the Hokie Invitational in 2012.

Bowerman watch
• After finishing last season as a semifinalist for the prestigious Bowerman Award, Tech thrower Alexander Ziegler was named to the Preseason Watch List prior to the 2013 season.
• The senior from Dischingen, Germany has been piling up accolades since setting foot on campus in 2010, earning All-America honors and medaling in all six seasons while becoming the second athlete in Tech history to win back-to-back NCAA titles in the hammer throw, and the fourth Tech athlete to earn multiple national championships.

Last hurrah
• Jason Cusack, Eric Hoepker, Michael Hammond, Will Mulherin and Alexander Ziegler’s clocks are ticking on the collegiate careers. The quintet have just under two months remaining before their eligibility is up after the indoor season.

Separating from the pack
• Seniors Jeff Artis-Gray and Michael Hammond have the opportunity to separate themselves from all others in the Tech record book as both are currently tied with former Hokies Gary Cobb, Keith Ricks and Ryan Witt for holding the most records in the men’s program.
• Hammond has only the indoor season to separate himself from the pack, while Artis-Gray has both indoors and outdoors.

German connection
• Currently, the Hokies have ninen athletes from Germany competing in four different events. Matthias Treff and transfer Sabine Kopplin in the javelin, Alexander Ziegler and Annjulie Vester in the weight throw/hammer throw, Stephan Munz and Martina Schultze in the pole vault, and Benny Unger in the hurdles.
• Jens Merseburg and Sarah Kadelka joined the team this January and will compete in javelin.

Back in Blacksburg
• After winning the pole vault at the 2011 ACC Indoor Championships in his first-ever event for the Hokies, Stephan Munz was back in Germany last year to complete his undergraduate degree. The Goeppingen native is now back at Tech as a graduate student this year while he continues his Hokie career.

High-flying German
• In her first year at Tech, pole vaulter Martina Schultze made an immediate impact as she earned All-America honors during both seasons and went one-two at the indoor and outdoor ACC Championships with teammate Victoria von Eynatten. Schultze claimed gold at outdoors with Von Eynatten coming out on top at indoors.

A small world
• Associate head coach and throws coach Greg Jack is looking to strike gold for a second time in Nitra, a city 4,700 miles away from Blacksburg, this time in hammer thrower Tomas Kruzliak. The Slovakian hails from the same city as former Hokie and two-time national champion Marcel Lomnicky.

Running into the record books
• Before the indoor season even kicks off, senior Will Mulherin has already supplanted himself as one of the top distance runners in Tech history. During the fall, he became the first two-time All-American cross country runner in Tech history while leading his team to the program’s first ACC Championship as he won the individual crown.
• Last year, he became the first runner in ACC history to win three champions in the 5,000 meters at the ACC Outdoor Championships.
• Against one of the top fields outside of nationals, Mulherin re-broke his school record in the 3000 meters in Seattle with a time of 7:55.64.

Summer success in Mexico
• Junior sprinter Darrell Wesh earned a gold medal last summer at the NACAC Under-23 Championships in Guanajuato, Mexico as he teamed with Charles Silmon, Marcus Rowland and Keenan Brock in the 4x100m relay. Wesh ran the lead leg for the group that ran a time of 38.94, besting teams from the Bahamas (39.65) and Jamaica (39.67).

Seeing double
• When you hear or see the name Degfae, know that it could be either Leoule (Lee) or Tihut (Tee). Since Leoule joined his brother at Tech after transferring from Tennessee after one year, the two have competed together during only two seasons at Tech, once on the cross country team in 2011 and the other was the 2012 outdoor season.
• Leoule redshirted the entire 2011 season after joining the Hokies and Tihut redshirted the 2011 indoor season.

All-American siblings
• By finishing fourth in the 100 meters at the NCAA Outdoor Track & Field Championships, Darrell Wesh joined his older sister Marlena as an All-American in the Wesh family.
• A senior at Clemson, Marlena is a four-time All-American and competed for Haiti in the 2012 Olympic Games.

Elite level
• Redshirt junior Frances Dowd won the NCAA Elite 89 Award last season, an honor presented to the student-athlete with the highest cumulative grade-point average participating at the finals site for each of the NCAA Championships. She finished 15th in the 800m (2:09.38) at the 2012 NCAA Indoor Championships.

Sticking to the East
• With only two trips to the West Coast on their travel schedule this year, the makeup of this year’s Hokies show that the team tends to remain east of the Mississippi. The furthest athlete west of Blacksburg is from Huntsville, Ala., and 59 of the team’s 94 athletes are from the state of Virginia.

For updates on Virginia Tech track & field, follow the Hokies on Twitter (@VT_Track).