Complete Track & Field Notes | Jan. 30, 2009 
Jan. 29, 2009
NORMAL, Ill. -
The Illinois State men's and women's track and field teams head to the Wisconsin Elite Invitational, hosted by Wisconsin, Friday and Saturday at the Camp Randall Memorial Sports Center in Madison, Wis. Live results from the Wisconsin Elite Invitational will be available by visiting GoRedbirds.com
The Redbirds will face Marquette, UW-Milwaukee and Wisconsin, as well as select individual athletes. The meet is slated to begin at 1:45 p.m. Friday afternoon with the women's pentathlon and the men's heptathlon. Team competition begins Saturday with the running events getting underway at 11 a.m. and the men's weight throw beginning the field events at 11:30 a.m.
"We want to make sure we become sounder in our fundamentals each and every weekend," said head coach Elvis Forde. "We are starting to see our legs come back and our fitness improve in terms of our competitiveness. We need to keep our eye on the prize, which is the conference championship (State Farm Missouri Valley Conference Championships, Feb. 28-March 1)."
The Illinois State men's and women's teams will look to build upon their strong individual performances from last weekends' home meet (Redbird Invitational, Jan. 24) where the `Birds combined for 12 first-place finishes.
Freshman Steve Regan, who is currently undefeated in the 800-meter run and holds a personal-best of 1:53.54 in the event, will be trying his hand in the mile. Sophomore Matt Mroczynski will also get a chance to take on the mile for the first time this season.
"We want to find out how people perform in different events," said Forde. "This week is a break from what we normally do. It is a non-scored meet so we can give our kids the opportunity to try something new."
In the women's events, freshman Tori Ziegler will get an opportunity to improve upon her personal-best and conference-leading throw in the shot put. Ziegler threw the shot put 48-0.5 feet last weekend at the Redbird Invitational. The mark was not only a conference leading mark but ranks as No. 3 in the ISU record books.
The meet will mark the first time this season junior Morgan Schaefer and sophomore Katelyn Massey will compete in the pentathlon. The pentathlon consists of the following events: 60-meter hurdles, high jump, shot put, long jump and the 800-meter run.
"I think that indoors during the course of the year our multi-events don't get much of a chance to participate in all their events and this meet will give them the exposure to they need. A lot of times, meets that do not have a separate competition for multi-events force athletes to run from one event to the next to try to compete in all of the events in the discipline. I think that giving Morgan and Katelyn the opportunity to compete in all the events will benefit them at the MVC Championships."
