Santa Ana Warms up for OEC Track and Field Finals
Santa Ana's Toni Lopez finished with a time of 39:39.87 to win her first Orange Empire Conference title in the 10K event.
RIVERSIDE, Calif. – On Friday, Apr. 21st the Santa Ana College Track and Field team competed in the Orange Empire Conference Preliminaries held at Riverside College.
It was an impressive outing for the Dons, as many members of the team recorded personal records (PR) to a make it a successful day.
In the 100-meter event, Cydnee Wallace hit a PR and qualified for the OEC Finals. With no semi-final for the 200-meter event, she has also qualified for the 200-meter event finals.
Toni Lopez shared the lead for the first 7 laps of the 10K event but then shifted to another gear to take sole possession of the lead for good. Lopez dominated the event to earn her first OEC Track & Field title with a time of 39:39.87.
Jazlyn Madrid also competed in the 10K event and crossed the finish line with a new PR at 49:11.93.
In the men's 10K event every Don hit personal records.
It was an exciting race as Santa Ana's Paulino Sanchez led for over four miles until a couple of Orange Coast College runners surged to catch up. Sanchez then paced himself behind the two OCC runners until the final lap. With 400 meters left in the race, Sanchez and OCC's Danny Dominguez pulled out all the stops, hitting a 61-second mark in last 400 meters. Paulino was defeated by less than a second to finish runner-up at a time of 32:59.54.
Eduardo Guapilla moved up gradually to finish in 5th place, and Brian Ambrocio kept pace throughout to place 6th. Eric Jimenez was in 4th place for most of the race but lost ground to his teammates to finish in 7th place.
Jeremiah Gill and Manuel Arjon rounded out the Don competitors to finish 21st and 26th in their first collegiate 10K event.
Overall, several Dons qualified to compete in the OEC Finals on Friday, Apr. 28th being held at Riverside College.
