Jan. 21, 2012
BIRMINGHAM - In his first meet of the year, junior sprinter Harry Adams ran the fastest time in the world so far in 2012 in the the 60 meters with a time of 6.55 seconds as he took home the event title on Saturday at the Auburn Indoor Invite at the Birmingham Crossplex.
"I'm really impressed with what Harry was able to do today," Auburn head coach Ralph Spry said. "He's been solid for us from the beginning, but he worked hard all fall and he's looked good in practice. I thought he would be ready to run fast today. It was a very impressive win and I couldn't be happier for him to get rewarded for all his hard work. I'm looking forward to seeing him get faster the rest of the season."
Adams' time is the best for any sprinter in the world thus far in 2012 and is also the second-best time in Auburn history behind former Olympian Coby Miller's 6.50 in 2000. The time is also a career high for the 2010 NCAA Indoor All-American.
"I feel pretty good with what we were able to do as a whole," Spry said. "We made a big improvement over the course of one week and that is what you want to see. It's a short indoor season, so you have to make improvements like that. I'm pretty pleased overall. We had a lot of big performances.
"This was a very competitive meet with some of the best teams in the country competing. This was a good measuring stick of where we are at as a team."
There was no team scoring of the event.
Sophomore Niklas Buhner made it two-for-two in 2012 as he cruised to his second win in as many weeks in the mile run after finishing in 4:08.93. Buhner was also part of the first-place 4000m distance medley relay team with freshmen Adam Civitano and Kane Grimster along with junior Jeff Sanders in 10:05.77.
Both senior Monica Carney and junior Maya Pressley cleared 5 feet, 9.75 inches (1.77m) in the high jump. The mark was a season high for Carney. Sophomore DJ Smith set a new high mark with a clearance of 2.14m (7 feet, 0.25 inches) in the men's high jump.
The event got rolling on Friday night with the men's and women's weight throw. After fouling on each attempt a week ago, sophomore Stephen Saenz won his first event of the season on Saturday with a first place finish in the shot put.
The Rio Grand City, Texas native needed only one throw to top his closest competition by nearly a full meter (19.23m to 18.29m) as he finished with a winning throw of 63-1.25 inches on his first attempt. Junior Marcus Poppenfoose posted a throw of 17.61m (57 feet, 9.5 inches) to finish fourth.
Keenan Brock had another strong week in the 60 meters. A week after coming within six-hundredths of a second of qualifying for NCAA Indoor nationals, the Birmingham native placed seventh in the finals with a seventh-place finish in a nearly identical 6.67 seconds.
Racing for the first time in over 13 months, senior Marcus Rowland performed well in the 60m prelims and posted a time of 6.79 seconds, but narrowly missed qualifying for the finals. He also raced along with Adams as the second and third legs of the 4x400 meter relay team later in the day.
In the women's 60 meters, junior Kai Selvon and senior Ashley Cruder placed fourth and seventh in the finals, respectively. In the finals, Selvon equaled her time from a week ago at 7.38 seconds, while Cruder crossed the finish line 7.49 seconds.
Selvon also placed fourth in the 400 meters, just ahead of teammate Nivea Smith in 23.66 and 23.69 seconds, respectively. Junior Alissa Fisher kept her strong start to the indoor season going with sixth-place finish in the mile run in 4:49.76.
Auburn is off next weekend before heading to Blacksburg, Va. on February 3 for the Virginia Tech Invitational.