Track and Field Earns Three SEC Weekly Honors
Tuesday, April 20, 2010 | Track and Field
Three University of Florida track and field athletes have earned weekly honors from the Southeastern Conference for their stellar performances at the Tom Jones Memorial Classic this past weekend, the league offices in Birmingham, Ala., announced Tuesday afternoon.
Senior thrower Mariam Kevkhishvili (Tbilisi, Georgia) is the SEC Female Field Athlete of the Week, redshirt freshman thrower Jeremy Postin (Andover, Kan.) is the SEC Male Freshman of the Week and senior sprinter Calvin Smith (Lutz, Fla.) is the SEC Male Runner of the Week.
Kevkhishvili won the women's shot put at the Tom Jones Memorial Classic with a nation-leading throw of 18.46m/60-6.75, shattering her previous personal-record throw of 18.05m/59-2.75. That throw was the second-best in school history and she became just the second woman in school history to throw better than 60 feet in the shot put. She currently ranks ninth in the world in 2010 in the women's shot put event.
Postin won the men's hammer throw competition at the Tom Jones Memorial Classic with a school-record throw of 60.59m/198-9. He broke his own school-record throw of 59.90m/196-6, recorded earlier this season at the UCF Invitational in Orlando, Fla. He became the first person in school history to throw better than 60 meters in the men's hammer throw, doing so as just a redshirt freshman.
Smith won the men's 400-meter dash at the Tom Jones Memorial Classic in a 2010 world-leading time of 44.81. He competed in a field that consisted of Tyson Gay, a seven-time World Champion, and Renny Quow – the third-place finisher at the 2009 Berlin World Championships, defeating both competitors en route to the victory. His time went down as the second-fastest in school history and bettered his previous personal-record time of 44.96, recorded at the 2009 SEC Outdoor Championships.
The Gators return to action this Thursday when they travel to Philadelphia, Pa., to participate in the prestigious Penn Relays Carnival at historic Franklin Field. The three-day event runs through Saturday in the City of Brotherly Love.
For all of the latest information on Florida track and field, please log on to www.GatorZone.com/trackfield or, for up-to-the-minute updates, follow the team's Twitter account @GZTrackField or www.twitter.com/GZTrackField.
SEC TRACK AND FIELD ATHLETES OF THE WEEK (WEEK 5 – APRIL 20, 2010)
Male Runner of the Week: Calvin Smith, Florida
Male Field Athlete of the Week: Israel Machovec, Georgia
Male Freshman of the Week: Jeremy Postin, Florida
Female Runner of the Week: LaTavia Thomas, LSU
Female Field Athlete of the Week: Mariam Kevkhishvili, Florida
Female Freshman of the Week: Kimberlyn Duncan, LSU
END OF REPORT
