Illinois Wesleyan’s Glueck, Leonard win national titles

Posted on May 27, 2016

By WJBC Staff

WAVERLY, Iowa — Illinois Wesleyan sophomore Amelia Glueck won the national championship in the long jump and IWU senior Max Leonard won the national championship in the discus at the NCAA Division III Outdoor Track and Field Championships at Zimmerman Field on the campus of Wartburg College in Waverly, Iowa, on Thursday, May 26.

Glueck had a distance of 19 feet-9 inches to win the event while senior teammate Nia Joiner placed seventh in 18 feet-9 inches. Senior Jill Harmon was 10th with her distance of 18 feet-5.75 inches.

With four events scored, IWU is in second place with 12 total points, trailing only Ithaca with 20.

After the first four events of the heptathlon, Harmon is in third place with 2980 points. The leader, Hilary Coady of Wooster, has 3067 points. Harmon won the 100 meter hurdles (14.60 seconds) and the 200 meter dash (25.80) portions of the heptathlon while tying for fifth in the high jump (5 feet-1.75 inches) and seventh in the shot put (34 feet-9.5 inches).

Also on Thursday, the women’s 4×100 meter relay team of senior Angela Herrmann, Glueck, junior Maddison Zimmer and Joiner got second place in the preliminaries with a time of 46.63 seconds to qualify for Saturday’s final.

In the pole vault, Jamie Gradishar finished in 12th place at 12 feet-3.5 inches. Senior Amanda Macuiba did not advance to finals, finishing 17th in the preliminaries of the 3000 meter steeplechase with a time of 11:12.34. Senior Erin McCarey did not finish in the 10,000 meter run.

The 4×400 meters relay team ran a 3:48.10 and finished 10th, not qualifying for Saturday’s finals. The team consisted of Zimmer, Herrmann, Liz Oltman and senior Lauren Killough.

Leonard won the discus with a throw of 175 feet-8 inches.

Leonard is the first Illinois Wesleyan men’s national champ since Jason Dennis won the indoor shot put in 2000. He is IWU’s fifth men’s track All-American since 1990. Malik Jones was the indoor 55 hurdles champion in 1990 and Heath Weddle was the high jump champion in 1991 for both the indoor and outdoor championships.

Junior Eric Rydell will compete in the high jump beginning at 11:30 a.m. on Friday.

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