By Nate Wilson-Traisman

With no indoor track to call home, the going has been tough for Macalester’s men’s indoor track team. Nevertheless, its first meet showed signs of promise. The squad kicked off its season Saturday in a four-team meet at Bethel, which was highlighted by two first place and two second place Scot finishes.

Evan Mitchell ’08 paced Macalester’s individual effort. Mitchell placed first in the shot put (42-10 ¬) and placed second in the weight throw (48-4 _).

“It was an evaluation process,” coach Martin Peper said of the meet.

The Scots exhibited speed in the sprints at Bethel, with sprinters Kevin Williams ’09 finishing first and Andrew Yokum ’09 finishing second in the 55-meter dash.
Williams finished in 6.67 seconds, with Yokum crossing the line on his tail, in
6.69 seconds.

“I could tell we had speed, but the starts were not particularly stellar,” Peper said.

Other notable performances were Wade Eckstrom’s ’10 third place finish in the mile (4:26.82) and Martin Stenman Andersson’s ’10 third place finish in the pole vault (12-0).

Bethel, Augsburg and Northwestern College also competed in the meet. Team scores were not recorded for the event.

Peper noted that the early part of the season has been difficult for the Scots, who have been left with no real practice facility. With the absence of an athletic center, throwers have had to travel to St. Catherine’s, while jumpers and hurdlers have bounced between practices at Concordia, Bethel and St. Thomas. As a result, the athletes have had less than the desired practice time.

Macalester only registered competitors in about one half of the events, a fact that is indicative of their practice dilemmas.

“The talent is there,” Peper said. “It’s just going to take a little longer to bring it out this year because we can’t practice as long as we should. That’s just the nature of what it is.”

Macalester will travel to Northfield on Saturday to compete at the Carleton College Meet of the Hearts. The meet is scheduled to begin at 11 a.m.