Outdoor Track and Field Season Begins Friday with Cal Poly Open

Friday, March 4

San Luis Obispo, CA

TBA

Cal Poly Open

Big West hammer throw champion Emily Hallett (left) and 400-meter winner Anisa Rind (right) return for another track and field season at Cal Poly this spring.

Outdoor Track and Field Season Begins Friday with Cal Poly Open

3/2/2022 11:34:00 PM | Track and Field

HEAT SHEETS | MEET SCHEDULE

SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. -- Nearly 10 months ago, the Cal Poly women's track and field team captured its first-ever Big West Conference championship while the Mustang men finished second for the ninth time in 24 years as a member of the conference.

Can the two teams attain the same kind of success in 2022? The groundwork begins Friday as the Mustangs host the Cal Poly Open at the Steve Miller and John Capriotti Athletic Complex.

Competition begins at 11:30 a.m. with the hammer throw and shot put. Running events start with the 3,000-meter steeplechase at 2 p.m. and the meet is expected to wrap up with the 4-by-400 relays at 5 p.m.

The Mustang women's squad defeated Cal State Fullerton by 32 points for the Big West crown and will have three individual conference champions and five runners-up on the roster this spring.

The contingent of returnees is led by 400-meter champion Anisa Rind, Big West hammer throw winner and school record holder Emily Hallett, and Cassidy Hubert, who along with Rind ran on the winning 1,600-meter relay team. Hubert also finished second in the 400 .

Other top returnees include Sierra Brill, who claimed second place in both the 5,000 and 10,000, and Shelby Daniele, second in the 200 and third in the 100 last spring.

Paige Hansen (second in the javelin), Adelae Fredeen (fourth in the javelin and fifth in the heptathlon) and Amaya Lopez-Fuller (third in the discus) also return for the Mustangs.

On the men's side, Cal Poly, which finished just six points back of Big West champion Cal State Fullerton, collected many of its points from the 5,000 and 10,000 with three finishers in the top seven of each event. Jake Ritter (third in the 10,000 and fourth in the 5,000), Spencer Thurman (fourth in the 10,000, seventh in the 5,000) and John Bennett (sixth in both events) all return for the 2022 season.

In addition, Dylan Bouzigues (second in the decathlon), Devon Cetti (third in the shot put), Mathis Bresko (third in the pole vault) and Bailey Jones (fourth in the triple jump) also return.

Tyler Esteves earned points with a fourth in the 200 and running legs on the 4-by-100 relay (fourth) and 4-by-400 relay (sixth) teams. Also back is Bikram Thiara, who placed fourth in the 110 high hurdles and 400 intermediates as well as running a leg on the sixth-place 4-by-400 relay team.

Hallett (hammer throw) and Ritter (10,000) both qualified for the NCAA West Preliminary at Texas A&M a year ago. Hallett broke her own school record of 193 feet, 0 inches at the Big West Championships while Ritter owns the fifth-best 10,000 time at Cal Poly of 29:01.61, set in the Sound Running College Invitational.

Later this season, Cal Poly will host two other meets -- the Cal Poly Invitational on March 25-26 and the Mustang Invitational on April 22.

UC Davis will host the Big West Conference Championships on May 6-7 (decathlon and heptathlon) and May 13-14 (all remaining events).

The NCAA West Preliminaries will be held May 26-28 at Fayetteville, Ark., with the NCAA Division I National Championships set for June 8-11 in Eugene, Oregon.