BLACKSBURG, Va. – VMI's Distance Medley Relay posted a second-place finish in its event, pacing the Keydet men's track and field team on the opening day of the Big South Indoor Championships, contested Friday in Blacksburg, Va.
The DMR unit of Max Midkiff, Julian Jackson, Jacob Lysher and Avery Martin posted a time of 10:06.41 to finish second, coming up just .23 seconds shy of the title. Martin's mile time of 4:07 led the way, as the mark was some nine seconds under any open mile he had run previously. Other splits including Midkiff at 3:10 for 1000 meters, Jackson at 49.6 for the 400 leg and Lysher at 1:59 for 800-meters.
While many of the other events were preliminaries, VMI was able to score in one additional competition, notching points in the pole vault. Skyler Toney tied for sixth and Grant Holmes finished in a deadlock for eighth, both clearing 4.40 meters (14'5 ¼”).
The Keydets currently sit seventh overall with 11 points, five points behind Charleston Southern (16). Liberty leads the way at 74.5, with High Point (37) and Campbell (36) also in the top three. Gardner-Webb (30) and Radford (17.5) are fourth and fifth, with UNC Asheville (6) and Winthrop (6) rounding out the team scores.
Quincy Murphy had a busy day Friday, including taking part in the first four events of the heptathlon. Murphy wound up in second place with 2895 points, 86 markers out of the lead. He posted the field's second-best mark in the 60-meter dash at 7.15 seconds and did so again in the day's final event, the high jump (1.99 M/6'6 1/4”), and will lead off Saturday with one of his best events, the 60-meter hurdles. Murphy, in fact, took part in the preliminaries of the open hurdles Friday and qualified to Saturday's final with a personal best of 8.21 seconds, the fourth-fastest time run this afternoon. The junior also finished ninth in the high jump with an open career best 1.89 meters (6'2 ¼”).
Several runners advanced to finals in their events, including Martin, who was the top qualifier to the 800 final thanks to his 1:52.91 time. Lysher (1:54.70, 3rd) and Dmitriev (1:54.31, 8th) will join him in the 800 final Saturday. Both Martin and Dmitriev posted IC4A qualifying times in their respective races.
Aron Long and Greg Henderson also moved on, advancing through a bizarre 200-meter dash that saw four disqualifications, including one of the pre-race favorites, Rozzie Johnson of Charleston Southern. Long finished fifth in 21.83 seconds and Henderson was the final qualifier, crossing the line in 22.18 seconds. Henderson's time was the first IC4A qualification of his young career.
Jordan Bailey will run Saturday as well after he qualified seventh to the 400-meter final. Bailey crossed the line in 50.08 seconds to advance to his first Big South final.
"Day one is only halfway to the finish line," said VMI head coach Darrin Webb. "I asked our team all week to lay it all on the line, forget times and just beat our competition. All was not perfect, but our team continues to fight and we had over 30 seasonal bests today. On the men's side today, Avery Martin's effort in the DMR was outstanding, and Quincy Murphy did a good job rebounding from a disappointing long jump to perform very well in his other events. I am proud of our whole team's day one effort and know everyone will come out tomorrow with more of the same."
VMI track and field returns to action Saturday, concluding the Big South Championships in Blacksburg. Action gets underway at 10 a.m.
