WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – The Radford women's track & field team took sixth place in the Big South with 34 points at the conference's indoor championships Thursday and Friday at the JDL Fast Track. The Highlanders received a boost from the distance squad's strong showing and a hard-earned point in the pentathlon by Maddie Wright who was also named Big South All-Academic this week.
 
For the distance crew, it was Hannah Moran leading the way once again, scoring 16 points for the Highlanders. Moran started off her week by blasting the previous Radford school record by nearly 35 seconds in the 5,000m. She finished second in the event with a time of 16:51.37*, missing the win by just 0.09 seconds. Both she and winner Hannah Brookover of High Point broke the previous Big South meet record. In the same race, Abby Seigel ran 19:01.39, good for a top-10 time in school history.
 
Moran continued on Friday with another second-place finish, this time in the 3,000m. Again, Moran narrowly fell to Brookover but took home All-Conference honors in a time of 9:51.83. Chloe Wellings notched four points for Radford with her fifth-place finish in the event.
 
In the women's mile, there were PRs everywhere as MegAnne Gilmore, MacKenzie Garner and Kayland Bond all set top-10 times in Radford history in both the preliminary and final rounds, continuing steady improvement for the Highlanders on the season in the event. Gilmore ran under 5:10 for the first time, doing it twice with an ultimate time of 5:06.34, good for two points in a very fast final.
 
The DMR team once again wrapped things up strongly for the Highlander distance group. The team of MegAnne Gilmore, Julia Burkley, Brianna Krug and Chloe Wellings finished 2^nd in the event with the third-fastest time in school history, running 12:09.91.
 
Outside of the distance events, All-Academic honoree Maddie Wright used a strong finish in the 800-meter run in the pentathlon to move up and snag a point with her 2,903 points good for eighth place.
 
The 4x400 team of Julia Burkley, Maddie Wright, Denisha Hoosier and Brianna Krug closed out the competition for the Highlanders, earning three points for their sixth-place finish in a season best time.
 
Also in competition was Kelsey Arnold who improved upon her previously set 10^th best mark in school history in the triple jump with a 10.93m (35-10.5) mark; and Denisha Hoosier set a season best in the 60m with a time of 7.85
 
*All times listed prior to conversion from flat track.
 
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"I am so proud of the work our team did over the last two days. The support for each other was so fun to witness," said Director of Track & Field Shelli Sayers. "We will carry this momentum into the outdoor season where I believe we will be an even stronger team."
 
UP NEXT
The Highlanders open up the spring season on March 18-19 at the Fred Hardy Invitational in Richmond, Va.
 
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