After a successful indoor season, the Virginia men's and women's track and field teams have begun the outdoor season and have only a few meets before the ACC Outdoor Championships. Last weekend, the Cavaliers performed well at the 49ers Invitational in Charlotte, N.C., and Virginia will look to turn in another strong performance today and tomorrow at the Raleigh Relays. The field tomorrow includes all but one of the Cavaliers' ACC opponents, so it will be a chance to get another look at the competition.
Also, Virginia does not have an indoor facility to use when training for the indoor season, and they consider the outdoor season to be their forte.
"We had a really good indoor season," said senior pole vaulter Vika Osipenko, who set a school pole vaulting record in the indoor season. "Since we are more of an outdoor team, I expect us to perform even better this spring. We've been training since September and I think everyone is ready to show some really good marks."
The Cavaliers will use the Raleigh Relays as a stepping stone to their ultimate goal --a strong showing at the ACC Championships, April 18-19. Coach Randy Bungard also shows some optimism about the chances of the Virginia women winning the ACC title, especially after their 4th place finish in the Indoor Championships in February.
"I think if everybody has a really great meet" they can win, Bungard said. "They need to be all hitting on the same cylinder. And Carolina needs to falter a little bit, just because they are so deep, but on any given day that can happen. We showed that last year when our men finished 3rd [in the ACCs]--nobody expected them to do that."
One reason the Cavaliers are excited about their chances this season is because they have had only limited chances to show their full arsenal of weapons.
"We had a lot of All-ACC performances at Indoor Championships," Osipenko said. We "are looking to place even more people in the top three, especially since there are several events which were not contested during the indoor season."
Along with consistent performances and leadership from Osipenko, coach Bungard gets valuable leadership from another senior, sprinter Kiamesha Otey. For the men, fifth-year senior Brian Kollar, an expert in the throwing events, is coming off a redshirted campaign last year and leads by example in order to motivate the teams.
"I never name team captains," Bungard said. "I let the captains emerge, because you might name the wrong guys or if you vote, it might be the most popular and not the guys it should be. We're a team, but we're kind of segmented" so each group has it's own leaders.
Virginia can be relaxed going into the Raleigh Relays because it is not a scored meet. Thus, they can expect strong individual performances to come from a meet that is not likely to be pressure-filled.
"We're using this as a meet to kind of see where we are in our open events," Bungard said. "Relays are fun. We're going to go out there and see where we are and have some fun."
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