FULLERTON, Calif.-- Bakerfield's men's and women's track and field teams competed at the Ben Brown Invitational this weekend.
Women
Freshman Ariana Mariscal (Bakersfield, Calif., North HS) excelled in the 800m race, finishing with a time of 2:15.28. The Bakersfield native's time lowered her career best time set two weeks ago at the WAC Indoor Championships and broke her tie with Jackie King (1986) for ninth best female performance in Bakersfield history in the 800m.
Alyssa Page (Jr., Santa Rosa, Calif., Montgomery HS) and Marina Emhoff (Fr., Bakersfield, Calif., North HS) both posted strong showings on the day. Page finished 11th in the 400m with a time of 57.92 while Emhoff placed 16th out of 49 runners with a time of 59.61. The pair also competed in the 200m dash and finished as the top two 'Runners. Although Emhoff's time of 26.24 was good enough for 32nd in a large pool of 79 student-athletes, Page finished sixth overall at 24.70.
Page is still chasing her career best of 24.33 from 2012 which made her the fourth fastest female Roadrunner at the distance in program history. Nevertheless, the time on Saturday was her season best by nearly half a second.
With a throw of 111-10, Gabby Giuliano (So., Bakersfield, Calif., Stockdale HS) finished fifth in the javelin competition which consisted of 24 student-athletes. Audrena Harlan (So., Antioch, Calif., Dozier-Libbey Medical HS) increased her season-best distance in the long jump by almost a foot with a jump of 17-03.25.
Men
As already highlighted in yesterday's released, Bryan Wilmert (Jr., Bakersfield, Calif., Liberty HS) had a career day on Friday in the hammer toss. Joining Wilmert with a strong performance on Saturday was Karnell Grimes (Jr., Rosamond, Calif., Rosamond HS) who threw a distance of 181-06 in the javelin. His toss was good enough for fifth place overall out of 29 and was just under two feet short of Grimes' personal best set in 2013 (183-02).
Derek Stotler (Vista, Calif., Rancho Buena Vista HS) started out the outdoor season slowly as the distance runner posted a time of 4:44.99 in the 1500m last weekend in Los Angeles. With a 2013 season best time of 4:11.68, Stotler certainly performed below the level of his ability last week. Cutting his 2014 season opening time by almost 20 seconds on Saturday with a time of 4:26.80, Stotler proved he is on track to continuing in his role as one of Bakersfield's strongest male distance runners.
Bakersfield will return to the track in two weeks at the Cal Poly Invitational in San Luis Obispo, Calif. The 'Runners will compete on Friday and Saturday, Mar. 28-29.
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