2017-18 Shocker Women XC and Track & Field

[1972Shocker]

Shocker Rebekah Topham running unattached in the 3,000 meter steeplechase at the Portland Track Festival High Performance meet this past weekend finished 6th with a time of 10:00.98. This time is 20 seconds faster than Rebekah's official Wichita State PR. The current WSU school record is 10:12.28 set by Mica Land in 2008. The winning time at this year's AAC Outdoor Championship was 10:27.10. Think Rebekah will make an impact for the Shocks when she returns to active duty next year?
:onthego:

[goshox74]

Thank you '72! And that time could get Rebekah into the USA Championships next week against the professionals. More great experience in hopefully taking her to the next level. A lot of focus has been on Topham and the emergence of Winny Koskei (and rightly so), but the Shockers also redshirted another Winny (Kibet) who was last year's Junior College national champion in cross country. This 1-2-3 punch and the development of a couple freshmen from last year's bunch will make it interesting in the AAC for the next couple years.

[1972Shocker]

Thank you '72! And that time could get Rebekah into the USA Championships next week against the professionals. More great experience in hopefully taking her to the next level. A lot of focus has been on Topham and the emergence of Winny Koskei (and rightly so), but the Shockers also redshirted another Winny (Kibet) who was last year's Junior College national champion in cross country. This 1-2-3 punch and the development of a couple freshmen from last year's bunch will make it interesting in the AAC for the next couple years.

Thanks goshox74 . I was not familiar with Winnie Kibet. She is not listed on the Shockers roster but I did see an announcement from this past December that she is moving on from Colby JC to Wichtia State. I'm assuming she transferred between semesters? From what I can tell she has completed 2 indoor and 2 outdoor seasons at Colby and will have 2 full season remaining.

Kibet's improvemnet from her Freshaman to her sophomore season was pretty impressive. From 5:45.21 to 5:20.77 in the indoor mile, from 10:48.92 to 10:16.33 in the indoor 3K, from 19:45.44 to 17:53.40 in the indoor 5K and from 41:54.90 to 37:24.02 in the outdoor 10K.

Comparing Winnie (Kibet) to Winny (Koskei) to Rebekah based on their official PR's wih the 2018 best time in the AAC in parenthesis:

Indoor Mile: 5:20.77 - 5:12.80 - 4:45.75 (4:45.01)
Indoor 3K: 10:16.33 - 9:58.15 - 9:36.13 (9:26.62)
Indoor 5K: 17:53.40 - 17:05.16 - No Time (16:26.76)

Outdoor 1500m: 5:05.26 - 4:40.82 - 4:23.09 (4:16.09)
Outdoor 5K: 17:54.93 - 16:19.47 - 16:17.69 (16:09.99)
Outdoor 10K: 37:24.02 - 33:30.31 - No Time (33:30.31)

Winnie's outdoor times are from 2017 as she apparently sat out this past spring and Rebekah's times are from her sophomore season in 2016-17 as she took a redshirt this year.

Cross Country will be interesting. Last year the Shocks top 5 runners included 1 Sr. (Jordan Maestas), 1 So. and 3 Freshman. Rebekah's best CC 6K time would have won the AAC Championship. Winnie's best CC 6K time would have finished 36th.

The AAC has a lot of good young runners though so moving up the ladder will not be real easy. Just adding Rebekah back in the mix should move the Shocks up a bit. Year after next maybe when the Shocks make their big move but we'll see.

[goshox74]

In regards to Winnie 2 (Kibet), yes she joined the team in January so that's proably why the media department missed getting info up on her (although they should have). She ran a few races unattached this spring but mainly focused on training so her current PR's aren't an indication of where she will be in 2018-19. I've talked to Coach Hunter and he says she trains right up there with Rebekah and Winny 1. I think the top 5 for XC will be Topham, Winny 1, Winnie 2, Yazmine Wright and either Rita Schnacker or Gabriella Reyna. Wright and Schnacker ran several good races while redshirting their freshman year and Reyna is a top talent who was hurt during track but ran well in cross. That top-5 should challenge to be top-3 in the AAC.

[1972Shocker]

Shocker Junior-to-be Rebekah Topham, who redshirted this past season, will be running in the 3k steeplechase coming up shortly at 1:50 pm at the USA Track and Field Championships.

Former Shocker and future Shocker Hall of Famer Nikki Larch-Miller will be competing in the heptathlon on Saturday. Nikke is competing for the Santa Barbara Track Club.

http://goshockers.com/news/2018/6/21/track-and-field-shockers-begin-usatf-outdoor-championships.aspx

Rebekah's decided to redshirt because she that an additional year of training and maturity would put her in a position to compete at the very top of her events nationally during her final 2 years at Wichita State. That decisions combined with the huge loss of talent form the 2016-17 Shocker women's team was largely responsible for Coach Rainbolt's decision to redshirt nearly half of his young Shocker women's team this past season with an eye towards the future.

Considering Nikki Larch-Miller and her twin sister Taylor are plastered all-over the Shocker record books; the loss of very good mult-event athletes in Breanne Borman, Gavyn Yetter and Martiesha Caines plus Sidney Hirsch in the distance races and Jamiesa Milton in the shot put, hammer and weight throws and it's not hard to see why the rebuilding was necessary this past season. These 7 ladies have combined to record 33 Top 10 marks in the Shocker record books during their careers including 11 school records..

[1972Shocker]

Rebekah Topham, competing for the first time in her Shocker colors since redshirting, ran 10:00.59 to finish fifth in the first heat and 12th overall of the 3000m steeplechase prelims at the USATF Outdoor Championships. Her time not only set a personal best, it also breaks a 10-year old school record time of 10:12.28 set by Mica Land.

Topham ran splits of 46.50, 1:19.83, 1:18.20, 1:19.10, 1:20.36, 1:21.76, 1:19.86 and 1:15.00. Her last lap split of 1:15.00 was the fastest of all competitors.

The Griswold, Iowa native advances to the finals of the 3000m steeplechase on Saturday, June 23 at 3:20 p.m. The finals will be aired on NBC.

While Rebekah's time was 12th best of the 14 qualifiers she was in the slower of the two qualifying heats. Also she is 1 of 4 qualifiers associated with a collegiate team. Katy Kunc of Kentucky had the fastest time of the collegians at 9:55.76, 2 spots in front of Rebekah. Sarah Scott of Oklahoma, the Big 12 steeplechase champion, and Grayson Murphy of Utah picked up the final two qualifing spots finishing 13th and 14th. However, I believe Katy Kunc and Grayson Murphy have used up their collegiate eligibility and Sarah Scott will be a redshirt senior next year.

Rebekah's probably not quite ready to run with the "old" ladies yet but she can certainly hold her own in the collegiate ranks in this event.

http://goshockers.com/news/2018/6/21...ol-record.aspx

[1972Shocker]

BTW, the AAC record in the women's steeplechase is 10:17.84 set in 2014 by Tova Magnusson of SMU. Not sure if the AAC will recognize Rebekah's race today as the new AAC record but apparently the Shocks are recognizing it as a new school record.

[1972Shocker]

Rebekah was never really in her race today in the 3k finals. She finished 13 in 10:04.45 which isn't a bad time by any means but it was 4 seconds slower than her time in the prelims and well off the 9:.17.70 winning time posted by American Record Holder Emma Coburn who is an absolute stud athlete. Great experience for Rebekah.

[WuDrWu]

Nikki sits in 9th place with 3 events left tomorrow. Cannot even begin to describe how amazing Nikki, Taylor and their entire family are.......wonderful people and Nikki is an incredible athlete, especially when she's allowed to be healthy. Taylor ain't bad either. Nikki could move up as high as 6 with a good day imho.

[1972Shocker]

Nikki sits in 9th place with 3 events left tomorrow. Cannot even begin to describe how amazing Nikki, Taylor and their entire family are.......wonderful people and Nikki is an incredible athlete, especially when she's allowed to be healthy. Taylor ain't bad either. Nikki could move up as high as 6 with a good day imho.

Nikki finishes in 11th place with 5,597 points. Hard to say where NIkki is at in her training and conditioning and whether or not she is fully healthy but her score is a bit short of her college best of 5,812 points. However, even that score would on have been 9th best in this competition so that tells you the level of competition in this championship meet.

Two ladies did break 6,000 points. Alex Gochenour, a 2016 Arkansas grad, was 2nd with 6,003 points and Erica Bougard, a 2016 Mississippi State grad, won with 6,357 points. That was well below Bougard's best this year of 6,725 which 3rd in the world this year trailing the leader by 81 points.

The American and World record holder is, of course, Jackie Joyner-Kersey 7,291 points. Records are made to be broken but that one will probably take some doing.

[WuDrWu]

I actually think that Nikki may have impaled herself on a stray javelin during the meet. Not saying it hit an artery, but it couldn't have improved her ability to perform, that's for sure. She often makes light of how clumsy and injury prone she is.....she certainly could use a bit more good luck in that area.

[1972Shocker]

Wichita St T&F/XC @GoShockersTFXC Jun 22

.@Pau_garcii runs the sixth fastest 200m (24.01) in Shocker history, finishing fourth in section B of the Meeting Madrid. Results will be found in the link below at a later time. Her next competition will be at the Spanish Championships.

Paula, from Madrid, will be a sophomore for the Lady Shocks next year. This time knocks nearly a half second off of her collegiate best. Like the progress.

[1972Shocker]

Wichita St T&F/XC @GoShockersTFXC.@Pau_garcii finished second in the 200m at the U23 Spanish National Championships with a time of 24.02. She won her prelim in 24.66. : https://bit.ly/2NzlJNa

That is the fastest time in School history although I don't know if an overseas race will be recognized as school record and I don't know if it was wind aided. Looks like it may have been a +2.0 wind buty not sure about tht. Audacia Moore is currently at the top of the Shocker record book clocking 24.16 in 2011.

Impressive effort by the sophomore-to-be.

[goshox74]

Audacia's time you mentioned is from indoor. The outdoor record is held by Nikki Larch-Miller in around 23.2. And yes the marks from oversees will count towards the top-10 list (which I think Garcia is now #6).

[1972Shocker]

Audacia's time you mentioned is from indoor. The outdoor record is held by Nikki Larch-Miller in around 23.2. And yes the marks from oversees will count towards the top-10 list (which I think Garcia is now #6).

My bad. I must of clicked on the wrong link in the record book. Thanks for the correction. Still good to see from one our the Shocks possible up-and-comers. With 3 years to go perhaps Paula can challenge Nikki's recor\ before she is through.

[goshox74]

Besides Paula, look for Jacque Darby (who ran 24.1 as a freshman and redshirted last year) and Taniyah McMillian (Oklahoma freshman who redshirted too). All 3 of these girls could be really good sprinters. The entire women's team will look very different in 2019.

[1972Shocker]

Thanks. I had mentioned Jacque in a previous post but wasn't familiar with Taniyah. As young as this team is the arrow is pointing up in 2019 and beyond. It certainly helps if you have quality depth that allows teammates to push each other to improve.

[WuDrWu]

Nikki sits in 9th place with 3 events left tomorrow. Cannot even begin to describe how amazing Nikki, Taylor and their entire family are.......wonderful people and Nikki is an incredible athlete, especially when she's allowed to be healthy. Taylor ain't bad either. Nikki could move up as high as 6 with a good day imho.

Nikki has been selected to represent the USA in the Thorpe Cup. http://thorpe-cup.runnerspace.com/ep...news_id=538513