THE WEEKEND AHEAD: D1 schools all over the country; D2 schools stay close to home...


For most of Washington's nine Division I and II schools, this is the final weekend to put marks up to convince coaching staffs to put borderline athletes on the travel squad for the conference championship meets coming up in two weeks.

The Division I schools will be spread out across the country this weekend, while the Division II schools are staying close to home.

DIVISION I...

The Washington Huskies are in three places starting Thursday, with most of their women's distance group plus 400 hurdler Anna Terrell in Philadelphia for the Penn Relays.

The Huskies, who have the number one event group in the 800 meters, will run both a 4 x 800 and a distance medley relay consisting of Chloe Foerster Samantha Friborg, Marlena Preigh, and Wilma Nielsen (Paul Merca photo).

They also have a 4 x 1500 team entered, along with individuals entered in the 5000 and Terrell in the 400 hurdles.

The men's distance group is off to Stanford, California for Friday night's Payton Jordan Invitational, while everyone else heads to Clovis for the Fresno State Invitational on Friday and Saturday.


Gonzaga is making a rare appearance in Des Moines, Iowa for the Drake Relays, where both the men's and women's teams are entered in the distance medley relay and the 4 x 1600. The Zags also have a small number of entries in individual events.

Washington alum Gianna Woodruff is scheduled to run in Saturday's women's invitational 400 hurdles at Drake.

USATF.tv ($) is streaming the meet, while the live results are available here.

Eastern Washington is sending a squad of primarily field event athletes plus some sprinters and hurdlers to Tucson for Saturday's Desert Heat Classic hosted by the University of Arizona.

Washington State alum Emmanuel Wells is also entered in the 100m at the Desert Heat.

Washington State, Seattle University, Eastern Washington and Gonzaga will send parts of their teams to Corvallis for the Oregon State University High Performance meet on Friday and Saturday.  They'll be joined by a small group from Central Washington University.

DIVISION II...

Seattle Pacific and Saint Martin's will head up Interstate 5 to Bellingham for Saturday's Ralph Vernacchia Invitational hosted by Western Washington University at Civic Stadium.

That meet will be followed up on Monday and Tuesday, as the Great Northwest Athletic Conference championship meet technically begins with the decathlon and heptathlon. The main portion of the meet begins May 10th in Ellensburg at Central Washington University.

PRAKEL AND RYAN HEAD TO GERMANY FOR ADIZERO ROAD TO RECORDS...

Seattle resident Sam Prakel, and Washington State alum Paul Ryan are headed to Herzogenaurach, Germany for Saturday's adidas Adizero: Road to Records races, which is a series of four road races on the adidas world headquarters campus.

According to a release from adidas, this year’s line-up brings 120 world class adidas athletes from 26 countries to compete in the newly-established 800m and 1 mile races, as well as the 5K and 10K.

Both Prakel and Ryan are entered in the road mile, where they will face countryman and current world road mile record holder Hobbs Kessler.

Prakel was the first official world record holder in the road mile when he won the USATF Road Mile championship in Des Moines, Iowa last year.

The four races of the Adizero: Road to Records will be streamed on the adidas YouTube channel Saturday beginning at 11:45 pm Friday night (8:45 am Saturday in Herzogenaurach, Germany).


NOTE: The Penn Relays, Drake Relays, & adidas, and the sports information offices of Fresno State, Oregon State, and Western Washington contributed to this report.

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