It’s always nice to have an extra week to prepare.

For the men and women’s track teams, the extra week before Heptagonals this year allowed them one last chance to tune up for the conference championship at the Larry Ellis Invitational at Princeton on Saturday.

This year’s Heps were pushed back a week, so the invitational this past weekend coincided with most of the other conference championships that are taking place this weekend. Because of this, the field mostly consisted of Ivy League teams and a select number of other competitors whose conferences did not have their league tournaments this weekend.

“This meet was a good opportunity for us to tune up our skills for next weekend,” co-captain Beverly Whelan said. “Our young team is really starting to come together—still high off of our win against Yale a few weeks ago, I expect some great things to happen next weekend.”

And following this week’s strong performances, the expectations next week will be high for both the teams and the athletes individually.

WOMEN

Continuing in its theme for this year, the women’s team put up a number of personal records in the last meet before the conference championship.

As it comes into the final stretch, the Crimson looks like it is peaking at the perfect time and the athletes are ready for the big meet next weekend.

“The conditions, though a little hot, were perfect for fine tuning for Heptagonals,” Whelan said.

And although the weather was on the warmer side, Harvard put up a number of perfect “fine-tuning” performances.

One of the strongest examples came from junior Rosalinda Castaneda in the 3,000-meter steeplechase. Her time of 10:58 was not only a personal record, but also put her just two seconds from the qualifying time for the regional championship. She will look to break that mark and extend her season next weekend in what will be her last chance before the ECAC championships that begin on May 14.

Other peak performances solidified Harvard’s strengths all season long, which included junior Eleanor Thompson in the 400-meter hurdles and senior Jennifer Lee in the 800 meters.

In the 1,500-meter race—arguably the Crimson’s core strength on the track—Whelan and sophomore Laura Maludzinski went up against a line of Princeton runners and fought through them to grab second and third.

“Everyone else in the heat was from Princeton—they have shown to have the strongest mid-distance and distance programs in the league right now, but we were able to break them up,” Whelan said.

Unfortunately for them, Maludzinski and Whelan were one and two seconds, respectively, off of the 4:29 qualifying time for the regional championships and so will be looking next weekend along with Castaneda to make that small improvement in their time.