After having three personal bests on Thursday, sophomore Brittany Harrell continued her strong performance en route to her first Southeastern Conference win.
Harrell wrapped up her performance in the heptathlon on Friday with the long jump, javelin throw and 800 meters. The win was not only her first individual SEC title, but the 5,838 points Harrell earned was a school record as well, making her the indoor pentathlon and outdoor heptathlon record holder for Florida.
“I’m incredibly proud of Brittany Harrell,” coach Mike Holloway said. “It’s very satisfying when you see someone who works that hard have everything come together. Today was a total team effort and I have to credit our assistant coaches for preparing Brittany. Multi-events are really a collaborative effort and today showed that.”
Continuing with the trend from Thursday, Harrell set a personal best in all three events today. Her biggest improvement came in the 800 meters. Her time of 2:14.37 was over four seconds quicker than her previous record set.
"My best event was the 800 because it was such a big PR for me,” Harrell said. “I've been working hard with all of my coaches, but especially on mid-distance. I've been putting great effort into it and everything just came together very well."
After Harrell got 10 points on the board for the women, thrower Jeremy Postin did the same for the men by winning the hammer throw. Junior David Triassi was also able to add some points to the board with a fifth place finish.
"We're the first points of the meet for the Gators and it's a big deal to be able to get those 14 points and step up for people who can't compete this weekend,” Postin said. “We're starting off strong for the Gators and that's a big deal for me."
Mark Parrish, Josh Izewski and Callie Cooper also gave both the men and women points to bring their totals to 23 and 15, respectively.
Despite having an overall good day, Florida did have some difficulty qualifying in the prelims. There were nine Gators who didn’t qualify for Saturday’s competition.
“I think it was a great day on both sides for us,” Holloway said. “There were a few events where I wish we could have sneaked a few qualifiers in but this is the SEC, there’s no sneaking in anywhere. We’re going to put our cards on the table the next two days and see what we have.”
