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Friday, March 29, 2024
The Observer

Relay competes at Drake

Competition began Thursday afternoon at the Drake Relays in Des Moines, Iowa, as Notre Dame athletes competed in event finals in the men’s 4x1,600-meter relay.  Thursday marked the first action for the Irish since a successful debut at the ACC Outdoor Championships, where the men’s team finished third and the No. 22 women’s team finished second and just 15 points away from first place.

Irish sophomore sprinter Margaret Bamgbose dashes to the finish line during the Notre Dame Invitational on Jan. 25.
Irish sophomore sprinter Margaret Bamgbose dashes to the finish line during the Notre Dame Invitational on Jan. 25.
Earlier in the afternoon, Notre Dame ran the 4x1600-meter relay against competition from No. 14 Nebraska, No. 6 Georgia, Iowa and Missouri, among other schools. Graduate student and recent ACC gold medalist Nick Happe anchored the relay run by junior Chris Quinn, graduate student J.P. Malette and freshman Jacob Dumford as the Irish took third place with a time of 16:24.32, less than three seconds behind the winning relay from Washington and three-hundredths of a second behind runner-up Illinois.

This weekend’s meets are the first in a series of tune-ups before NCAA preliminaries in late May. The Irish travel to Bloomington, Ind., Charlottesville, Va., and Atlanta in a whirlwind couple of weeks before a short break leading up to national championships.

Action begins in earnest tomorrow, as Irish athletes compete in nine events in Des Moines. Junior sprinter Jade Barber, fresh off the first ACC gold medal in Notre Dame history, runs in the 100-meter hurdles alongside her sister, junior Kaila Barber. The gold medal women’s 4x400-meter relay is also back in action. Junior Emily Morris will compete in the shot put and senior Amanda Chamblee will throw javelin.

On the men’s side, junior Josh Atkinson will run in the 100-meter dash, and the men’s 4x400-meter relay unit of junior Chris Giesting, senior Jarrod Buchanon, freshman Harvey Smith and senior Patrick Feeney is also competing. In the field, junior Keith Mesidor and senior Logan Renwick are both entered in the long jump.

The Irish continue to compete at the Drake Relays today, and action begins at the Hillsdale Gina Relays in Hillsdale, Mich., in the early afternoon.