5/5/2008 1:49:54 PM
UW-Parkside's Jessica Lamp has had a good 2007-2008 athletic year. She won the GLVC Cross Country title in the fall, placed second at the Great Lakes Regional, and earned NCAA Cross Country All-American honors with a 14th place National Meet finish. During the Indoor Track season, she captured the GLVC 800m title, her fifth in five tries at the distance run indoors and outdoors. She was also the fourth place finisher at the NCAA Indoor Nationals at 800m. That list doesn't include the regular season meets in cross country, indoor track and outdoor track where she has won most of the races she has competed in, along with being in the Top 8 finishers of the Division I meets the Rangers have competed in.
Saturday at the GLVC Outdoor Meet Lamp was a double champion, with convincing wins in both the 1500m and 800m events. Lamp took control of the 1500m from the 400m mark and led a tight bunch of four at the 1200m, with a closing burst, she won the event by 8 seconds and earned a season best mark of 4:30.24. Ninety minutes later, she returned to the track to earn the victory in the 800m with a time of 2:15.12, nearly 2 seconds in front of the runner-up in the event. In the 800m, Lamp stayed near the front through 700m where she closed out the race moving from third to earn her winning margin.
The win in the 800m event was her sixth GLVC 800m Title in six tries at the Indoor and Outdoor Championships.
The Rangers scored a total of 42 points in the meet and placed eight out of the 10 participating schools. The following is the list of scorers for the team: Naomi Fulton earned a fifth place in the 1500m (4:49.82) and a fourth in the 3000m Run (10:25.93). Missy Nilles was fifth in the pole vault with a height of 3.11m (10' 2.25"). Jennie Kindt and Angie Peterson placed sixth and seventh respectively in the 10,000m run with times of 41:48.68 and 41:57.15. Chelsey Schadler and her twin sister Courtney each earned an eighth place finish. Chelsey was eighth in the 1500m Run (4:58.41) and Courtney in the 800m Run (2:23.15). The Rangers put together a 4x100m relay for the first time this year and placed seventh with a time of 55.88. The team included, Nilles, both Schadlers and Whitney Olson. The same group, minus Nilles and plus Brittany Glassburn, earned a sixth place finish in the 4x400m Relay with a team season best of 4:09.09.
Coach Mike De Witt commented on the GLVC Meet: "Jessica Lamp stole the show for the team. She did an excellent job of racing smart and her finishing efforts in both races had the crowd taking notice. There were some other excellent performances that were overshadowed by Lamp's performance. The freshman duo of Jennie Kindt and Angie Peterson did a great job in the 10000m Run. It can be difficult for freshmen to adjust to 25 laps of the track when the longest they ran a year ago was 8 laps in a 3200m. Both women ran solid splits, with both halves of their races within a few seconds. The Schadler's have been a great surprise during their short tenure on the team. They have trained for 6 weeks and had no real track backround, yet each worked their way into the Top 8 scoring places in the meet. They are great competitors as well as quick studies as to how to race. Along with the great efforts mentioned there were a few disapointments in the meet. Senior Naomi Fulton has battled physical issues in every meet this spring and she finished out of the All-Conference honors for the first time since she was a sophomore. Freshman Brittany Glassburn came into the meet with the third best 800m time in the conference, but was tripped up at about 250m and finished the race, but well out of the points. Valerie Hubbard was also expected to be a factor in the 3000m Run, where she was the only athlete in contention that hadn't raced prior to the event. She had to pull up with a leg muscle issue. With just a little better day from those three, we would have been in the mix for a Top 5 team finish. Track is just like any other sport, when everything isn't clicking right, you don't get the best results you could have had."