Records are made to be broken.
However, fans and members of the Oregon women’s track and field team never expected school records and personal bests to continually fall during every meet this season.
According to the athletes, all of their success so far can be credited to the new leadership under first-year head coach Martin Smith.
Junior Laura Harmon is one of those Ducks reaping the benefits after knocking almost 26 seconds off her personal best in the 5,000-meters three weeks ago at the Stanford Invitational.
At Saturday’s Pepsi Invitational, Harmon achieved a new personal best in the 3,000-meters with a time of 9 minutes, 45.52 seconds. It was nearly eight seconds faster than her previous indoor record of 9:53.55, set at the Husky Preview in 2003.
Harmon said that she is happy about the way things are going after Oregon defeated three teams to win the 15th edition of the Pepsi Team Invitational at Hayward Field Saturday.
Most people “didn’t expect great things from our team,” Harmon said. “I think we’re definitely surpassing what people thought we were going to do.”
Harmon, a Vancouver, Wash., native, said that the team’s success so far is instilling a positive attitude and confident environment that has been lacking the past couple of years.
“Our athletes are definitely making strides toward bigger goals and we’re doing it as a whole team,” Harmon said.
Junior Clarice Hayward-Lee is one example of the new philosophy. Despite winning the triple jump event Saturday and setting a new personal best of 40 feet, 4 3/4 inches, Hayward-Lee said afterward that she was still unsatisfied with her efforts.
“I was happy with my 40-foot jump but I wasn’t really happy with my overall performance that I had,” Hayward-Lee said. “I had a lot of 38-foot jumps, but I was aiming for something higher.”
The Bellevue, Wash., native dominated her competition as she defeated the second-place finisher, Colorado’s Liza Negriff, by almost a foot. Negriff’s best mark was 39-07 1/4.
In the long jump, junior Maegan Traver also set a new personal best of 17-06 1/4.
Other personal records also fell for the women. Sophomore Megan Kriz threw 181-09 in the hammer, which placed her fourth all-time in school history. She is now less than 10 feet away from the Oregon record of 191-04 set by Jordan Sauvage last year.
Her sister, Rachael Kriz, also set a new personal best with her high jump of 5-08. Kriz celebrated her jump immediately afterwards on the landing pad as the crowd of 3,514 at Hayward Field acknowledged the feat.
Kriz credits assistant coach Rock Light for working with her on her technique.

“(Coach Light) is just trying to get my basics nailed down before we try anything complicated, which is always nice,” Kriz said.
But the most notable record broken so far has been redshirt junior Sarah Malone’s own javelin record of 179-07 achieved two weeks ago. It eclipsed her personal best by five inches. The mark not only broke her own record, but it placed her first all-time in Oregon history.
“We’re all healthy,” Malone said. “We’re all throwing farther than we ever have, so (the coaches) are obviously doing something right.”
Back on the track, junior transfer Sofie Abildtrup has provided a spark for Oregon’s sprint events. Abildtrup is expected to play a big role in the 200-meters and 400-meters, while also being the anchor of the 4×400-meter relays team.
Her time of 54.49 in the 400 at the Pepsi Invitational ranks her ninth all-time for the Ducks. She also moved to seventh place in Oregon history in the 200 with her time of 23.94.
Abildtrup said that the women were motivated to succeed in their respective events after holding a team meeting last Thursday to discuss their upcoming goals.
“We decided we wanted to get out of our comfort zone and just start breaking some (personal records),” Abildtrup said.