Mar. 7, 2008

By Gary Petit

WESTERVILLE — The Ohio Northern men’s distance medley relay team won its first ever OAC Title to lead the Polar Bears on Day 1 of the OAC Indoor Track & Field Championships hosted by Otterbein.

Ohio Northern leads the men’s team standings through three events with 41 points. Heidelberg is second with 22 points followed by Otterbein with 16.

The DMR team of junior Eric Porter, freshmen Evan Heyman, Travis Isenberg and junior Jimmy O’Brien won the event with a time of 10:26.50, five seconds faster than its nearest competitor.

Senior Ryan Robertson led a group of five ONU placers in the long jump with an NCAA provisional mark of 23-4 to finish with All-OAC honors in third place. He eclipsed the provisional mark on his final attempt after coming up one centimeter shy in two of his previous jumps.

Also placing in the long jump were freshman Jacob Fox (22-0.75), juniors Dominic Clouse (21-6.75), Justin Linzy (21.3.25) and sophomore Brandon Pritchard (21-2), who finished 5th-6th-7th-8th, respectively.

Sophomore Alan Bowsher set a school record in the 3,000-meter run to earn his first All-OAC honors in track with a third place finish. His time of 8:49.84 shaved 10 seconds off his season-best and bettered the previous school record of 8:50.29 set by Brad Schroeder in 2004.

Finshing close behind Bowsher was junior Paul Lewis in fourth at 8:50.57 and fellow junior Thomas Adam in fifth at 8:51.02. Lewis cut nearly 13 seconds off his previous career-best as Adam was eight seconds clear of his season mark.

In preliminary action Friday, Robertson qualified first in the 55-meter dash with a time of 6.50. Teammate Justin Linzy will start beside Robertson as he quailifed second with a season-best time of 6.52.

Fox also took the top qualifying spot in the 55-meter hurdles with a time of 7.73.

Due to the inclement weather, the start has been pushed back on Saturday to accomadate team travel. The field events are scheduled to begin at 3 pm with the first running final to start at 6:45 pm.