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In the final day of competition at the Penn Relays, Omar Craddock
used a personal-best effort to double up his hardware in the men's
triple jump.
The sophomore jumper won the event for a second consecutive year
with a leap of 16.46m/54-0 on his third attempt. Craddock became
the first athlete to post back-to-back victories in the men's
triple jump since 2001-2002.
"This weekend, I thought, across the board, we got better," UF
coach Mike Holloway said. "That's always our goal going into any
competition, and I thought we did that this weekend. We also have
some things that we have to get back to Gainesville and work on,
because in two weeks, we're going to be in the midst of a battle
for the conference title."
Aside from Craddock's win, the No. 4 Gators men's team stayed
consistent in both Championship of America relays they qualified
for.
The 4x200 squad finished third, while the 4x100 foursome of Eddie
Lovett, Christian Taylor, Terrell Wilks and Jeff Demps finished
second with a time of 40 seconds flat after running a 39.79 on
Friday. Both relay teams finished in the same position they did in
the preliminaries.
"There were some things in terms of the relays that we could have
and should have done better, but I have to do a better job of
coaching those guys and getting them ready," Holloway said.
Over the weekend at Franklin Field, the Gators finished with eight
second place finishes, as Craddock's triple jump was Florida's lone
major victory.
At the Drake Relays in Des Moines, Iowa, Florida's men also found a
personal best, but this time, it came up short for the
Gators.
Sophomore Jeremy Postin broke his own school record with a toss of
66.12m/216-11 in the hammer throw, but Georgia freshman Justin
Welch answered with a career-best throw of his own to claim the
event by six inches over fifth-place Postin.
The Gators lone win at the Drake Relays came Friday by women's
thrower Keely Medieros, who took home the discuss after finishing
in second place in the shot put.
UF Communications contributed to this report.
