The Ball State University track and field team spent Friday and Saturday in Bloomington flexing its muscles with schools from across the Midwest.
The Cardinals competed in the non-scoring Gladstein Invitational, which featured events consisting of a regular race and an invitational race. The top 12 entrants based on previous performance were placed in each invitational race.
Coach Randy Heisler said separating the best competitors from the pack is an added bonus.
"It's one of the rewards for being good," Heisler said. "It's less congested and against good people."
The Cardinals competed against schools from the Mid-American Conference, Big Ten and Big East.
The 3,000-meter run was one event that featured an invitational. Sophomore Ali Bishel placed second in the invitational with a time of 9:42.22.
Bishel also completed the 800-meter run in 2:18.46, earning her a sixth-place finish.
Amanda Barnhart, a fifth-year senior, returned to action for the first time this season. She earned a third-place finish in the long jump with distance of 5.81 meters.
"It felt really nice to get back in the feel of things," Barnhart said. "I was pretty happy with my first jump back."
Heisler also received contributions from several freshmen. Among them was Natasha Baskin, whose time of 27.21 in the 200-meter dash was good enough for fifth place.
Heisler stressed the importance of big meets like the Gladstein for his freshmen. "It was a really good experience for our team to go to a two-day meet, especially with our freshmen" Heisler said. "It was an eye-opening experience for them. It's good for them to see that what they've been running all along is not going to get them to the next level."
As the team looks forward to another two-day event in Bloomington Feb. 1, Heisler said he recognized the affect of each meet.
"Overall, it was another step in the maturing process," Heisler said. "The competition is just going to get better and better."
Barnhart couldn't agree more.
"Right now, we're just concentrating as a team and looking to build on each meet by finding the positives from each," she said. "We're getting better competition each week, so when the conference meet comes, we'll be ready for it."
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