49er
Track ready for NCAA event
By Toby Lewis
On-line Forty-Niner
 A
small group of Long Beach State track and
field athletes will be attempting to improve
their qualifying marks at the Occidental
Invitational on Saturday.
Several athletes will be using the tournament,
which will be held at Occidental College
in Eagle Rock, as a last chance to qualify
for the Big West Conference championships
and the NCAA regional championships later
this month.
“We have a group of people who will be using
[the tournament] as a tune up for the conference
championships. Others will use it to try
and qualify for the conference championships,”
head coach Andy Sythe said.
Senior Cory Loebl and junior Stephanie Sampson
are among the athletes who will be looking
to use the tournament as a warm-up for the
conference championship tournament.
“There are those like Cory and Stephanie
who will be using the tournament to tune
up and get sharp,” Sythe said.
Both Sampson and Loebl are currently ranked
number one in the Big West Conference for
their respective events, the hammer and
the discus, and have already qualified for
the NCAA regionals.
Junior Bobby Lugo currently holds a 163
feet-7 inches mark for the discus and 177
feet 3 inches for the hammer, just a few
feet short from qualifying for the NCAA
championships.
“Bobby Lugo and Kristen Hambaroff are just
a short distance off from making the NCAA
regionals,” Sythe said.
Hambaroff will be looking to improve her
high jump record of 11 feet 6 inches at
the Occidental Invitational.
Currently, 17 women athletes are qualified
for 23 events and 25 men are qualified for
35 events at the Big West Conference championships,
Sythe said.
“We have a team where everyone has the potential
to meet the conference qualifying standard,”
Sythe said. “It will come down to the right
conditions. A good weather day and a nice
field helps.”
For the NCAA championships, five Long Beach
State men are qualified for seven events
and five women are qualified for six events.
There were no new conference qualifiers
after the UCLA Invitational tournament held
last weekend, Sythe said.
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