OVC Indoor Championships schedule of events (PDF)
COOKEVILLE, Tenn. – First-year Tennessee Tech track & field coach Wayne Angel knows the numbers are stacked against the Golden Eagles. His student-athletes, who will compete this weekend at the Ohio Valley Conference Indoor Championships, are also aware that the team's goals don't include challenging for the crown.
"Our goal at the OVC is to go into the weekend with the confidence that we have trained to the best of our abilities, and we hope to perform to the best of our abilities and let the chips fall where they may," Angel said.
And that means Tennessee Tech runners, jumpers and throwers will compete against themselves at the meet being hosted by Eastern Illinois University. Scoring points in the team standings would be a bonus, but the Golden Eagles are bidding for school records and personal best marks.
At least for now. In a few years, Angel expects Tennessee Tech to be pushing the powers such as Eastern Illinois, Eastern Kentucky and Southeast Missouri.
"Right now, we want improvements. I'm a realist. It's a process. We don't want a quick fix at Tennessee Tech. We just know we're moving in the right direction. It's a matter of being patient and taking it a step at a time," Angel said.
And the 18 student-athletes who make up the Tech roster are doing the things they are capable of doing in laying the foundation for the growth of the program. In addition from the coaching and training they receive from Angel and assistant coaches Eugene Frazier and Samantha Linck, there is plenty of support from within.
"We have really good team chemistry. We support each other really well," says senior Brooklyn Kimball. "There's more intensity and more is expected of us, and my expectations of myself are also higher."
Angel sees that support for each other every day in practice and during the meets.
"Yes, there's tremendous support for each other from within the team. They are encouraging and helping each other," he said. "The training is very intense, and they've learned to get through that with help and support from each other. They lift each other, and that makes for a very good situation."
Kimball says that team cohesion is necessary to cope with the expectations of the coaching staff via the level of competition during the meets on the schedule.
"It comes from our coaches," she says. "We are facing a higher level of competition, and we're putting ourselves into a position to do better. We're rising to the occasion at our meets."
Rising to the occasion has resulted in a couple of school records falling, and rewriting numerous personal bests
"Setting personal records is a big deal," Kimball says. "It's hard to beat your best. You set a standard for yourself, and then you have to try to improve on it."
Atlanta Westbrook, another senior on the team, agrees that the intensity of the team's training is key to lower times and longer jumps and throws. She set the school record earlier this spring in the triple jump, only to have to broken a week later by teammate Chelsea Mills.
"It shows our training is paying off," Westbrook says. "It would be frustrating to do the amount of hard work we're doing now and not see any results. We're ready for it physically, and now we're working on getting ourselves mentally ready for it."
Freshman walk-on Kayla Turange says the mental aspect is a key to success in this team sport in which every event except relays is an individual challenge.
"A major part of it is mental," Turange says. "You have to learn to make yourself do it. You can't think about it, you just have to go and do it. It's not hard to set goals, but it is hard to be consistent. If you don't break your personal goals, you can be disappointed, so you just focus on being consistent."
Angel points to several Golden Eagles who could have breakthrough performances this weekend, and his staff has been striving to help them, whether it's shaving a second or two off a distance time, or a fraction of a second on a sprint, or adding a a few inches in a jump or a throw.
"Even when we had the inclement weather, they contacted me to work out," he said. "They have shown a real commitment, passion and dedication that inspires me as a coach to give them the tools they need to make them better."
While anything can happen this weekend, among Tech's best hopes for establishing new school standards during the OVC meet are Mills and Westbrook in the triple jump, freshman Madison Stremler in the 800m, freshman Sonel Bezuidenhout in the 3,000m and 5,000m, Kimball at 200m and 400m, and the 4x400 relay team.
Mills is also expected to become the first Tennessee Tech athlete to compete in the pentathlon, a new event this year at the OVC Championships.
