Geoff Lambert posted two NCAA "B" cut qualifying times last weekend to earn the North Coast Athletic Conference Men's Indoor Distance/Middle Distance Runner of the Week Award. He is one of three Wabash athletes to own the top marks in their individual events going into this weekend's NCAC Indoor Track and Field Championships at Denison University.
Lambert won the 800-meter run at the Ohio Northern Friday Night Invitational last week with a time of 1:54.73 before picking up a second victory Saturday at the Capital Last Chance Meet, setting a new fieldhouse record after crossing the finish line in 1:53.78. That was just slightly slower than his season-best effort of 1:53.60, which should be fast enough to send him back to nationals for the second consecutive year. That time is also the top mark among all NCAC 800-meter runners this season.
Freshman Emmanuel Aouad owns two of the top marks in the conference indoor season of competition this year. He turned in a time of 7.82 at the Wabash Alumni Invitational in January. A month later he posted a top mark of 6.82 meters, or 22 feet, 4-1/2 inches, in the long jump to take the top spot in the league going into this weekend's events.
Senior Nathan Bates won the 2005 400-meter title and finds himself at the top of the 400 times this year. He ran a season-best 51.10 at the Illinois Wesleyan Titan Open in early February, 5/10ths of a second faster than last year's winning time in the event at the NCAC Championships. He will bypass the 400 this year, however, and compete in the 800 meters with Lambert in an effort to improve his NCAA qualifying time and join his teammate at the NCAA Championship Meet later this year.
Wabash has also put together the best 1600-meter relay time of the year with a time of 3:25.49. The team of Bart Banach, Mike Russell, Bates, and Lambert won the event last year with a time of 3:27.33, finishing nearly two seconds ahead of the second place team.
Competition at the 2007 Championships begins Friday afternoon at Denison University and continues through Saturday. Wabash was third at last year's meet, scoring a total of 92 points behind first place Allegheny (213 points) and second place Ohio Wesleyan (104).
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