In the pouring rain at 9 am Friday morning, South Carolina senior hurdler Jussi Heikkila won the 400m hurdles at the Penn Relays with a collegiate-best time of 51.06. Later in the day, USC captured its second event of the day, the women’s Shuttle Hurdle Relay, and finished as the runner-up in the women’s Championship of America 4x100m relay. USC advanced three relays and an individual to Championship of America finals on Saturday: Thomas Hilliard will run in the finals 110m hurdles, both its men’s and women’s 4x400m relays and the women’s 4x200m relay also advanced to the finals.
The Penn Relays meet will be shown on ESPN2 from 1 – 3 pm on Sat., April 28.
Heikkila’s time improves his own regional qualifying time. Heikkila is from Virrat, Finland and will graduate with honors in Finance in May. “Rain doesn’t bother me – you just deal with the conditions,” said Heikkila. “This gives me a lot of confidence heading into the conference meet.”
“He did a great job and handled the conditions so well,” said USC Head Coach Curtis Frye. “It’s his first win for him at any level in college and he really handled it all well – the race, the rate, the conditions. He is from Finland and is use to running in conditions like this. It’s a great win for him and a great day for the Gamecocks!”
Fellow senior Thomas Hilliard finished fifth in the race with a time of 51.89. Hilliard has run 50.49 already to regionally qualify. Hilliard later finished second in his heat of the 110m hurdles to advance to the finals on Saturday with a time of 13.81.
The women’s shuttle hurdle relay ran a time of 53.54 – the eighth fastest time in collegiate history. The winning relay was comprised of Chiquita Martin, Trier Young, Ronnetta Alexander and Brittney James.
“We came here to win,” said Alexander. “We started off with a prayer before the race and decided to mix up our line-up a little bit because the competition was stiff. The delay and the weather didn’t bother us – we came here to win.”
The women’s 4x100m relay ran a season-best time of 43.80 to better its regional qualifying mark to finish as the runner-up to LSU, who has won the 4×1 11 times in Penn Relays history with a time of 43.66. The relay was run by Martin, Natasha Hastings, Faraign Giles and Shalonda Solomon.
“This was a very good time and a very good experience for our 4x100m relay and it wasn’t about finishing second to LSU,” said Frye. “We will keep improving at the SEC meet and at regionals. We showed we could do a lot of things today with getting the stick around and each young lady did a good job running their legs. The big thing this shows us – we are in the game with LSU now.”
The men’s 4x400m relay won its heat to advance to Saturday’s Championship of America with a season-best time of 3:07.01. The relay was run by Jamil James, Quinten Moore, Keith Hinnant and Ray Miley. “I’m really happy with their time. They will have to turn their game up a notch because it’s going to take 3:04 to win the title, but they certainly have the ability to win this race tomorrow,” said Frye.
The women’s 4x400m relay, make up of Brandi Cross, Solomon, Hastings and Krystal Cantey won its heat to advance to the finals with a time of 1:33.86.
The men’s 4x100m relay ran a 41.20 to advance to the consolation finals Saturday.
In other events Friday: Precious Akins was sixth in the discus with a toss of 163′ 9; Chiquita Martin was third in her heat of the 100m hurdles (13.66) and Trier Young finished seventh in the same heat at 14.07.
