Greensboro, North Carolina – The 2021 NCAA Division III Outdoor Track & Field Championships opened on Thursday.
Robert Smith (decathlon);
Eli Odell (400-meter hurdles) and
Jonah Jones (3,000-meter steeplechase) are representing Wheaton in their respective events. Additionally, the men's 4X400-meter relay of Odell,
Andrew Lauber,
Max Veth and
Peter Van Os are representing the Thunder men's program in that event.
THURSDAY RECAP
THURSDAY RECAP
Odell participated in the prelims of the men's 4X400-meter relay on Thursday afternoon. His time of 53.01-seconds was second-fastest in his heat to automatically qualify the sophomore for the finals on Saturday afternoon. His qualifying effort was fifth-fastest overall among the 17 competitors in the event. The finals of the event are Saturday at 2:25 p.m. (EDT)
The 4X400-meter relay of Odell, Lauber, Veth and Van Os placed eighth overall among the 14 teams competing in the prelims on Thursday. Their effort of 3:14.09 earned the quartet a spot among the eight relays to compete on Saturday in the finals. The effort of the foursome was a mere .02-seconds ahead of the ninth-place time of Bethel (Minn.) in 3:14.11.
Smith competed in the first five events of the two-day decathlon on Thursday. Smith currently has 3,130 points in 17th place. Smith opened the event with a time of 11.56-seconds in the 100-meter dash to score 740 points. He added 506 points to his total with an effort of 5.62-meters in the long jump. His toss of 11.58-meters in the shot put gave him 581 points and his effort of 1.73 meters in the high jump tallied 569 points. He ran the 400-meters in 51.80-seconds to contribute 734 points. He closes the event on Friday with the 110-meter high hurdles, the discus throw, the pole vault, the javelin throw and the 1,500-meter run.
