by Benny Benton
WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – The Barton College women's indoor track and field team won four events and posted three other podium finishes in recording a fourth-place showing – its best ever – at the Conference Carolina Indoor Championships Sunday.
Senior Breyuana Kittrell claimed individual event titles in both the 200-meter dash and the 400-meter run, then anchored Barton's victorious 4x400-meter relay team. All three of those races were won with new Barton school records, part of five broken on the day.
Fellow senior Cimone Barbour, who ran the first leg of the 4x400, accounted for Barton's other event title with a victory in the 800-meter run. She did so while producing one of the 12 personal records set during the meet.
The other two members of the 4x400-meter squad, senior Zorayda Rodriguez and junior Alexandria Robinson, also had significant individual achievements. Rodriguez placed second in the long jump and third in the triple jump, while Robinson finished as the runner-up in the 400 for the second year in a row.
Rodriguez and Kittrell both completed the meet having earned five individual all-conference awards for indoor performances in their careers. They were both also part of relay teams that gained all-conference status all three years of the indoor program's existence.
Kittrell, a resident of La Grange, N.C., claimed the first event title in the program's brief history when she held off Robinson and 17 other competitors in the 400-meter run. Her time of 58.55 easily eclipsed Robinson's old school record of 1:00.04, which was set in last year's conference meet. Robinson also surpassed her old mark, turning in a PR time of 59.24 in finishing second again.
Once Kittrell broke through for Barton's first event title, the Lady Bulldogs quickly piled up more. Barbour defeated 18 others in the 800-meters with Barton's best time of the year in that event, 2:23.31, and Kittrell earned her second title of the afternoon with a 25.67 second sprint in the 200-meter dash. Kittrell broke her own school record in that event, a time of 26.20 set just two weeks ago. Robinson was fourth in the 24-runner field, posting a PR time of 26.42.
Barton's other event victory came in the final race of the day, the 4x400-meter relay. The Lady Bulldogs entered the weekend with the top-ranked squad in the Southeast Region, and the unit did not disappoint. Barbour, Robinson, Rodriguez and Kittrell raced to a time of 3:58.46, nearly eight seconds quicker than second-place Mount Olive and nearly three seconds faster than their previous school record of 4:01.38.
The day's other relay event, the distance medley, also saw Barton set a new school record. The foursome of Angelica Del Real, Tikycia Young, Andrea Roca and Lauren Yoho produced a time of 13:58.57, roughly 10 seconds better than the previous BC best. That squad finished sixth in an eight-team field.
Zoey Cook accounted for the other new Barton record. The senior matched her own school mark of 9.77 seconds in the 60-meter hurdles while finishing sixth in the preliminaries. She then surpassed that mark with a 9.74 in the finals, where she placed eighth despite the better time.
In addition to the school records set by Cook and Kittrell, nine additional PRs were established in the meet: Eva Amo-Mensah in the 60-meter dash and 400-meter run; Robinson in the 200- and 400-meter runs; Young and Alainah Taylor in the 200; Barbour and Roca in the 800; and Heather Cuddington in the mile.
Those efforts helped contribute to Barton's team total of 79 points. University of Mount Olive won the event for the second straight year with a total of 151. Limestone College edged King University in the battle for second place, 109 to 107.
Trailing Barton in fifth was Belmont Abbey with 51 points, followed by North Greenville University with 42, Converse College with 27, Lees-McRae College with 22 and new program Pfeiffer University with 21.
Kittrell individually accounted for 22 of Barton's points, and also had a hand in the 10 points earned by the 4x400 relay team for winning that event.
Rodriguez earned 14 points for her runner-up finish in the long jump and third-place showing in the triple jump, and Robinson collected 13 points for her second-place showing in the 400 and fourth-place finish in the 200. Barbour's win in the 800 earned 10 points, and Jamicia Jones claimed four points by placing fifth in the same event.
The distance medley team picked up three points with its sixth-place finish, and Barton gained single points for three eighth-place finishes: Amo-Mensah in the 400, Cuddington in the mile and Cook in the 60-meter hurdles.
The Lady Bulldogs tied for fifth among eight teams in the inaugural league meet in 2013 and finished sixth a year ago.
Barton will open its outdoor season on March 13 and 14 at the Seahawk Invitational, hosted by UNC Wilmington.
