The men and women’s 4x100-meter relay teams took first in the preliminaries and finals. The men produced the fastest time in the world this year; the women were the fifth fastest.
Florida’s track and field teams took the podium 25 times during the two-day home meet. Having earned 10 gold medals, the Gators were more than comfortable at the Pepsi Florida Relays.
Field athletes set the tone for the meet. They started Friday with five medals before the races began.
Freshman Alida Van Daalen earned a new school record in the women’s discus invite with a mark of 58.70 meters. She later earned first in the shot put invite Saturday.
In junior Sean Dixon-Bodie’s outdoor debut for the men’s long jump invite, he earned the first title of the day and a new personal best. Junior Claire Bryant took first for the women’s long jump invite.
Junior Talitha Diggs earned a new personal best in the women’s 200-meter with a time of 22.61 seconds.
The 4x800 team — consisting of redshirt junior Hugh Brittenham, redshirt senior Deshay Fernandes and sophomores Ryan Maseman and Sam Austin — took first to close day one’s events.
Redshirt senior Pjai Austin took first in the men’s 100-meter with a time of 10.10 seconds — a new personal best. The next medal was claimed by Diggs in the same event.
Florida finished the meet with a total of 20 personal record improvements.
The Gators will compete at home again on April 14 and 15 for the Tom Jones Memorial meet. The memorial will be their last home meet of the season.
Contact Namari Lock at nlock@alligator.org. Follow him on Twitter @Namari_L.
Namari Lock is a third-year journalism student and production staff member for The Alligator. She has previously worked as multimedia editor, opinions editor, graphic designer and as a general assignment reporter for the Metro desk. In her last semester at UF, Namari is making her Alligator Sports debut as track and field reporter.
