Jan. 18, 2008
NORMAL, Ill. -
In their final home meet of the indoor season, the Illinois State men's and women's track and field teams will play host to Illinois-Chicago with the running of the Redbird Invitational Saturday in Horton Field House. The meet is scheduled to begin at noon with the field events, while the running events will begin at 12:20 p.m.
Illinois State head track and field coach Elvis Forde is ready to see what the past 12 days of training have done for his team.
"We are excited in the sense that this will be our second week of training, and we are also a little nervous because we have a little soreness in our athletes," said Forde. "This meet will be a very small meet and will be very similar to last weekend's (Jan. 12) dual meet against Indiana State. We call this a `no pressure situation' for our athletes. It gives us a chance to experiment with our kids and try them in different events.
"It is also a chance for our top athletes to continue to polish their skills. We have only had 12 days of training, and I think that this will be a much better opportunity for them to run and perform, compared to last weekend."
The Redbird women will be led by senior sprinter Devon Williams, senior distance runner Suzy Turner and junior thrower Samantha Springer. Williams, 2007 State Farm Missouri Valley Conference Indoor Track and Field Champion in the 60- and 200-meters, will team up with Turner, a 2007 MVC Cross Country all-conference team member, as the leading runners for the ISU women. Springer will look to surpass her pervious marks in the shot put and weight throw events.
On the men's side, the duo of seniors Jeremy Johnson and DeAndre Tillman will lead the men's short and long sprinters. Sophomore Scott Krapf, who ran a career-best of 8:40.44 in the 3,000-meter run (Jan. 12) will be one to follow, as he looks to improve upon his previous time.
"I believe that when you are a competitive athlete, you want to be at the top of the ladder," said Forde. "It doesn't matter who you are going up against. If you have the capacity or capability to be the best, it is your responsibility to the program, to yourself and to your team to go out and perform at the highest level. We cannot ask anything more from our athletes than to give us their best effort, and that is what we will be asking of them this weekend."
