At the Indoor Heptagonal Championships this weekend, the Harvard women's track team racked up 110 points--one more than its first-place finish last year--but this year's performance still wasn't enough to keep Brown from taking its second indoor championship in three years. The Bears scored 120 points to edge out Harvard by 10--the equivalent of one first-place finish.

"The competition is so amazing now," Harvard co-captain Brenda Taylor said. "It's strong in every single event. In past years we would have won by 50 points with this performance. It just happens that both of us [Harvard and Brown] have more people than we did last year."

Just like last year, Taylor won three events--the 60-meter hurdles (7.64 seconds), the 60-meter dash (8.44 seconds) and the 200-meter dash (24.29 seconds)--and also ran the second leg of the first-place mile relay. It was enough to earn her the meet's Outstanding Performer honors for the first time of her career.

"It's nice to receive something, but the true spirit of it comes when you know you're scoring points for your team," Taylor said. "And that continued to be the most significant part of my day today."

Taylor buried her closest competition in her events--twin sister Lindsay Taylor of Brown in the hurdles and Skye Jay or Cornell in the sprints. None of her races were even close. Her time in the 200-meter dash time was the second-fastest ever at Indoor Heps.

Taylor also ran side-by-side with her sister on the second leg of the mile relay. The race was close until the final leg, when Harvard co-captain Marna Schutte--the three-time defending Heps champion in the 400--opened up a comfortable lead.

The mile relay team of sophomore Kendra Baron, Taylor, sophomore Amanda Shanklin--who also placed sixth in the hurdles--and Schutte won in 3:47.60. Harvard has now won the event three consecutive years.

Schutte won the 400 convincingly and placed third in the 200 with season-best times of 55.48 seconds and 25.17 seconds, respectively.