Red Raider Track Athletes to Compete at Nationals
March 07, 2000 | Indoor Track
March 7, 2000
LUBBOCK, Texas - The Texas Tech track and field teams will have a pair of representatives running for them at the NCAA Indoor National Championships this weekend in Fayetteville, Ark. The NCAA announced qualifiers last night and both Leigh Daniel and Gezachw Yossef were among those to make the cut. Daniel qualified in the women's 3,000 and 5,000 meter races while Yossef qualified in the mile run for the men.
Daniel will have an opportunity to defend her 5,000 meter national title which she won in 1999. The Lubbock native qualified for the event with her time of 16:02.28, which she set at a meet on February 12. It was the fastest time in the nation this year. Daniel qualified in the 3,000 with a time of 9:23.78, recorded on February 25.
Yossef qualified in the mile run after running a time of 4:02.55 last weekend at the Iowa State qualifier meet. The time set a new Tech school record.
Three other Tech athletes set provisional qualifying times during the season but missed the cut for the championships. Desmond Johnson and Michael Beasley had provisionally qualified in the 400 meter run and the high jump respectively while Ngozi Iwu had provisionally qualified on the women's side with a time of 2:08.58 in the 800 meter run. The NCAA limits the number of qualifiers for the championships and takes only a top tier of provisional qualifying athletes based on time performances.
The NCAA Championships kick-off this weekend with the first events scheduled to start on Friday afternoon. Daniel will race in the finals of the 5,000 on Friday night. The finals of the men's mile run and the women's 3,000 will take place Saturday evening. Results for the championships will be made available at the University of Arkansas website, www.hogwired .com