After having just about a week off, the Rams of the Fordham track and field team found themselves immediately right back in the thick of it, with the men’s and women’s teams participating in high-stakes meets on consecutive weekends.
The first of these two all-important competitions was the Atlantic 10 Track and Field Championships, hosted this year amongst the soft, rolling dunes and gently breaking waves of Virginia Beach, Va. Unfortunately, the Rams would find themselves disrupting the area’s beauty more than adding to it, as many of their performances in the 757 were disappointing and, quite frankly, ugly.
Looking first at the men’s side of this meet, one of the team’s usual standouts, sophomore Christian “C.J.” Weddington, kicked off the Rams’ time in the competition by just barely missing out on finals qualification in the men’s 60-meter dash, frustratingly finishing in ninth on the back of a time of 6.94 seconds. The next event, the men’s 400-meter dash, likewise saw Fordham fail to secure a finals berth. While sophomore Matthew Nurse had a strong showing for someone who has been sidelined with injuries for quite some time, running a solid time of 49.87 seconds, and freshman Sam Freeman also put in a respectable performance of 49.87 seconds, neither runner found themselves meeting the threshold needed to move on.
The Rams did have a finals qualifier in the next event, however, as sophomore Kevin Callaghan managed to place seventh in the preliminaries of the men’s 500-meter dash on the back of an extremely strong mark of 1:05.71. However, the finals would unfortunately not treat Callaghan too kindly, as he would go on to finish last in his grouping with a time of 1:06.04.
It was not until the men’s 1000-meter run that Fordham would have its next finals qualifier, the Rams having to wait till junior Nathaniel Bezuneh finished firmly in sixth in the prelims to celebrate something. Just like Callaghan, Bezuneh also found himself towards the back of the pack in his finals grouping, finishing in seventh place behind a time of 2:31.28.
Distance events continued to be fruitful for the Rams with the meet moving on to the mile run, as graduate student Colin Flood managed to show out for Fordham, his time of 4:13.78 being good enough for an impressive fifth-place finish on the day. The Rams would likewise lay claim to a top spot in the men’s 5000-meter run, with junior Steve Zucca placing himself firmly in ninth place behind a strong time of 14:33.04. Zucca would also go on to record a top-five finish in the men’s 3000-meter run, his time of 8:22.53 allowing him to lay claim to fifth. However, he was not Fordham’s highest finisher in this event, as junior Rodolfo Sanchez would actually manage to lay claim to the silver medal for the Rams with his incredible mark of 8:19.05.
Relays also proved to be a rather strong point for the men’s team on the weekend, with all three of the Rams’ teams placing within or near the upper ranks of their respective events. For starters, the four-man team of Sanchez, Flood, Bezuneh and freshman Dakota Strain impressively ran themselves into the top four of the distance medley relay, recording an astounding mark of 9:59.07. Also finishing in the four-spot of their respective relay was the 4×800 team, as the foursome of Flood, Rinn, freshman Sean Reidy and sophomore Darren Croke posted a solid time of 7:42.47. Finally, the Rams’ 4×400 squad just barely missed out on a top-five finish. The squad, composed of the aforementioned Nurse, Freeman, Strain and graduate student Erik Brown, nevertheless registered a solid time of 3:19.41.
On the field side of things for the men, the Rams were actually able to quickly notch themselves a top-five finish on the back of sophomore George Pomer’s performance in the men’s high jump, his mark of 1.82 meters good enough for fourth on the day. Apart from Palmer’s impressive performance, the Rams only managed to register two more top-10 finishes for the rest of the day: senior Eric Galante’s eighth-place finish in the men’s long jump and sophomore Michael Croke’s eighth-place finish in the men’s pole vault.
Despite some of the above-listed strong individual performances, the men’s track team overall fell quite short of their high expectations for this iteration of the A-10 Championship, finishing in eighth place out of only 11 eligible teams.
Turning to the women’s side of the meet, the Rams again had a rather rough time, as the team only had two finals qualifications across the entire meet — both of these thanks to the always-reliable graduate student Kyla Hill. Hill has been making the most of her finals appearances for Fordham, as she claimed a bronze medal in the 200-meter dash with a time of 24.41 seconds and broke her own school record in the 400-meter dash by running a blistering time of 55.58 seconds. Hill’s stellar weekend would not end there, however, as she helped spearhead the Rams’ charge in the 4×400 meter relay, leading a team that also consisted of sophomores Dillyn Green, Alexandra Williams and senior Michele Daye to a strong fifth-place finish.
Also of note for the Rams was freshman Michaela Gier’s stellar performance in the women’s pole vault, as Gier was able to break the school record for the event that she managed to set earlier in her rookie campaign, recording an impressive mark of 3.32 meters this time around that was good enough for a ninth place finish on the day. Yet, despite this and Hill’s heroics, the women’s team sadly found themselves towards the bottom of the event’s overall standings, finishing a measly 12th out of a field of 15 eligible teams.
Despite both the men’s and women’s teams having overall disappointing performances on the biggest stage of the year, the Rams were nonetheless forced to keep trekking forward, being asked to make a quick turnaround and ship out to Boston to compete in the Eastern Collegiate Athletic Conference/Intercollegiate Association of Amateur Athletes of America Championship (ECAC/IC4A Championship). However, the Rams once again struggled to put together a solid team performance. That is not to say that there were not impressive individual performances, however, as many of the regular standouts continued to roll.
On the men’s side, both Sanchez and Flood managed to qualify for the finals in the mile run; Flood’s impressive time of 4:08.62 was strong enough to win his preliminary heat. Just a few events later, in the men’s 500-meter run, Fordham managed to notch another finals qualification on the back of Yariv Simhony’s impressive time of 1:05.71. In the finals, all three were able to finish within the top seven of their respective events, with Flood actually winning the bronze medal in the mile rule.
Moreover, Bezuneh was unable to qualify for the finals in the men’s 1000-meter run, finishing just two spots outside the top-nine preliminary placement that was needed to move on. His mark of 2:27.72 in the race was nevertheless the 74th fastest time in the event at the Division 1 level in 2024.
The men then wrapped their weekend up with a pair of relays: the distance medley relay and the 4×400-meter relay. In the distance medley, the team of Bezuneh, Brown, Rinn and Reidy impressively ran themselves into fifth place, their stellar mark of 9:53.86 being the grouping’s best performance of the year. While the 4×400 team did not place quite as high, they still showed out for Fordham, as the foursome of Strain, Martinez, Nurse and Freeman combined for a seventh-place finish as well as a season-best time of their own: an impressive mark of 3:17.40.
On the women’s side of the meet, Hill stole the show once again with her impressive preliminary times — 7.65 seconds in the 60-meter dash and 24.87 seconds in the 200-meter dash — moving her on to the finals in both events. In the finals, Hill only continued to roll, as she improved upon her time in the 60-meter dash by .01 seconds (7.64 seconds this time around) in order to capture third place in the event. She also cracked the top five in the 200-meter dash with an impressive mark of 24.54 seconds: good enough for fourth on the day. Hill then combined with Daye, Williams and Green to compete in the women’s 4×400-meter relay. There, the Rams were able to end their weekend on a bang, as Fordham’s foursome was able to break the school record in the event with a phenomenal time of 3:45.68.
