The Jim Wuske Invitational occurred on Saturday and the Spartan track and field team participated. The Wuske Invitational meet is a larger meet hosted by Mount Union in Alliance, Ohio, with over ten different teams competing. With more individuals per event, there was a lot of competition. This year, the meet went unscored so there’s no telling who came out on top, but no one needs a score to show that the Spartans performed well (even if they don’t always win).

Despite the larger amount of competitors, the Spartan men and women still managed to bring home the bacon in the relays and the women came out on top in one individual event. Kelsey Aamoth was the star of the day: Out of thirty-three runners, she crossed the line first in the 3000 meter run, with a time of 10:33.09. The women’s distance relay (consisting of Olivia Zabrodsky, Juliana Ross, Taylor O’Neil and Kayla Andersen) also came in first with a time of 13:30.49. The men did the same with their distance relay (Galen Caldwell, Abdallah Soliman, Devon Belew and Gilad Doron) with a time of 10:44.55.

This was the fourth meet of the season, with another three dual meets to go before the UAA Indoor Championship meet. After that, the season stretches on until May with a slew of invitationals and championships (two of which are the NCAA Indoor championships on March 14 and 15, and the UAA Outdoor Championships coming in April), ending with the NCAA Outdoor Championships on May 24. This means the team is almost done with the smaller meets and is about to get into the heat of the season. Hopefully, as the season heats up so does the weather. Fingers crossed, both for victory and an early spring.