Trinity Western’s Praise Olatoke set a Spartans record in the 60 metres, clocking a personal best time of 6.82 to finish second in the preliminaries Friday at the Golden Bear Open in Edmonton at the Universiade Pavilion.
Olatoke broke the Spartans record of 6.88, which was held by both Calum Innes and James Linde. Olatoke betters his previous personal best of 6.90, which he ran at last year’s U SPORTS Championships. His time of 6.82 also automatically qualifies him for this year’s U SPORTS Championships.
The men’s 4x200m, with Trinity runners Kenny Blackman Jr., Ben Tjernagel, Romain Tourvieille De Labrouhe and Olatoke also ran an automatic qualification time, crossing the line in 1:29.03.
TWU head coach Shane Weibe called Praise’s performance “outstanding.”
“The men’s relay performance was fantastic,” Weibe added.
“They had great passing and it was an excellent showing.”
READ MORE: Langley-based Trinity Western University sprinter will run for Great Britain
READ MORE: Trinity Western athletes take top honours at Canada West
In the 3000m, Spartan Josh Woolgar had a personal best time of 8:37.73 to finish seventh, crushing his previous best of 8:48.96, which he ran last week.
On the women’s side of the 3000m, Joanna Williamswas second in 10:10.49, while Christina Sevsek had a personal best time of 10:23.00 to finish sixth.
Nikita Bradshaw finished seventh in the pentathlon with 3,021 points – a result that ranks her third all-time in TWU history within the women’s pentathlon.
In the heptathlon, Chris Weiss led the way through the first day, with 2,597 points, while Dominic Luccock (Delta, B.C.) is fourth with 2,511 points, Ethan Foster, a Langley native, is fifth with 2,497 points and Evan Castellani (Mission, B.C.) is eighth with 2,340 points.
Spartans will compete on Day 2 of the Golden Bear Open Saturday as well as at the University of Washington Open in Seattle.