051213 T&F Quotes
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PAC-10 CONFERENCE PAC-12 CONFERENCE 1350 Treat Blvd., Suite 500, Walnut Creek, CA 94597 // PAC-12.COM // 925.932.4411 For Immediate Release // Sunday, May 12, 2013 Pac-12 Contact // Natalia Ciccone ([email protected]) USC Contact // David Tuttle ([email protected]) 2013 PAC-12 TRACK & FIELD CHAMPIONSHIPS DAY 2 QUOTES Chizoba Okodogbe (Anchor), Oregon Women’s 4 x 100 “It was great. We still have some stuff to work on, but it was a decent time. We still want to run a little faster… a lot faster. We want to run 41.9.” Ryan Milus (Anchor), Arizona State Men’s 4 x 100 “Basically, I just trying not to get caught. My teammates did a great job getting it to me in front, so basically I was just trying to stay in front, stay relaxed towards the end of the race, and !nish it off.” “This is a good stepping stone for us, getting to regionals and nationals. We’ve been putting down great times this year, and hopefully we continue to keep dropping the time and getting better and better.” WHY THEY WON “Good stick passes. We work it at practice every week, having good, solid stick passes throughout the zones, and I think that was the key to getting the victory today” Davonte Stewart (Anchor), USC 4 x 100 (Finished 2nd) “I wanted to win. I’m trying to get the !rst place guy, so I wasn’t just thinking that I was happy to catch everybody else.” “This is going to be great for us. This is our !rst time doing this order for the 4 by 1, so it’s kind of new to us. So if we get used to it, we’re going to be good.” BEST PART OF THE RACE? “Everything but the handoffs. The handoffs were terrible, everything else was good. Shelby Houlihan, Arizona State Women’s 1500m “This win is huge. I never actually thought I would win. I knew I had a good chance if I played my cards right, and eve- rything went right. I knew I had a really good shot.” “It was tough. I didn’t feel totally 100 percent going in, my hamstrings were a little tight. I just kind of took the lead, went with it, and the last 400 I started picking it up gradually, and in the last 150 I took off and hoped no one would catch me.” ON THE LAST 20-30 YARDS “I was just looking at the !nish line. I was kind of looking to my side to see if anyone was creeping, but I was just fo- cused on getting there.” - more - 2013 Pac-12 Track & Field Championships Page 2 “We’re thinking of running the 5k. I’ve never run it and don’t really have a race strategy for it.” “This gives me a lot of con!dence. I took a week off because my Achilles was a little in"amed, that was after my 4:13, but I didn’t totally have all the con!dence after that and didn’t know how much !tness I lost. Obviously, I didn’t lose that much.” “I’m still learning the 1500, this is only the third time I’ve run it this year. I’m still learning it and seeing what kind of strategies work best for me, and so far it looks like ‘just run from the front’” Lawi Lalang, Arizona Men’s 1500m “I go the front and keep the pace. That’s my running style, I like keeping the pace” “I had doubts today. Sometimes, when you feel like you’re a novice, you feel like you can’t do it, but you just do it.” “The NCAAs are going to be tough, but I think this is it. I think this is my year. “I think it’s a nice thing to do the 10K and the 5K, so I’m doubling and pick up some con!dence.” Bryshon Nellum, USC Men’s 400m "It feels great. I knew this was going to be a breakthrough. I had a great competitor in Mike Berry. The whole year I've been thinking about Pac-12s being at home. I knew it was going to be very exciting, and knew it was going to be a good feel." "I feel good still. The hard race was the 400…now the 200 is going to be fun." ON WHETHER HE THINKS HE WILL DOUBLE TODAY "That's the goal. I'm gonna go out there and get ready and see what I can do." AFTER THE 200 “This feels amazing. This is exactly what we hoped for and planned for. After the 400m I knew this would be fun.” DID YOU HAVE FUN OUT THERE TODAY? “Oh yeah, that was a ton of fun.” “I doubled in the 200 and 400 in high school and coming into college I was planning on doing the same. Unfortunately I got hurt and I had to go through a lot of rehabbing and after a lot of years of getting healthy I !nally made it back.” “I’ve been working on this since I came back from the Olympic Games. My experience there brought me to a whole other level with track and !eld. Running with the best in the world, I knew I was able to come back and if I work hard, stay dedicated and stay healthy then I’d be able to perform the way I did today.” “My time in the 400 de!nitely surprised me. I’ve been working real hard and I had great competition in Mike Berry. He helped me make it through that race.” “The times I was running in practice, the work I was doing, I knew if I came out here and ran a smart race I could do it.” “The 400 right now is wide open. There’s a lot of performers out there. As long as I stay on the grind and stay healthy, my future is bright.” “I’ve been in a positive mode and stayed healthy. Things are going the way I planned it.” “It means a lot to be able to do this here. A lot of family, friends, and loved ones here. This is my school and it feels great to do this here.” 2013 Pac-12 Track & Field Championships Page 3 Phyllis Francis, Oregon Women’s 400m "I feel good. It's really hot." "That was a shock. I wasn't expecting to run that fast." "I'm not used to the heat but I felt good." "It feels great and I think our team is doing a great job on our way to winning another title. Go ducks!" Aaron Brown, USC (2nd) Men’s 100m “We went in there thinking we could get 1-2, we knew we were head and shoulders above the rest of the !eld, and we wanted to just go out there and execute and show that the Trojans have got some good sprinters.” “Obviously I would have liked to win, but I was to lose to anybody, it would be my training partner. He works really hard, and I’m really happy with the result overall.” “I want to maintain what I’m doing. I’ve been making steady progressions all year, and I just want to carry that momen- tum through to, to Nationals.” Beejay Lee, USC Men’s 100m “I’m feeling pretty good. I’m glad we were able to do that together, 1 and 2, as a team that’s pretty good. It was good for me to come and show I still have it, even though I transferred… that a lot of transfer athletes can still do it.” ON GETTING ALMOST IDENTICAL TIMES (.01 DIFFERENCE) ON SATURDAY AND SUNDAY “A lot of people doubted me and told me that it was windy and it was 3.9, that I wouldn’t be able to do it… that it wasn’t an accurate time. But I wanted to come out with a chip on my shoulder today and show them I’m at 10-oh sprinter.” “I’m just going to keep trusting my coaches, trusting my teammates. This helps me go to regionals calm, relaxed and con!dent and carrying this into it." ON GETTING FLAK FROM AARON BROWN “He’ll give me a little something, but we’ll see what we can do in practice.” Reggie Wyatt, USC Men’s 400m hurdles “This is my last Pac-12 Championships, its here at home, and I wanted to come out with a W and leave it all on the track.” ON PUTTING UP THE FASTEST TIME ALL YEAR IN THE 400M HURDLES “It feels great. My training is coming along where it needs to be, and what I need to improve on to run faster.” “I did really good on !nishing strong this race. It’s been something I’ve been working on and its been coming along good.” WERE YOU EXPECTING THE WIN? Not really, I just wanted to go out there and get the W 2013 Pac-12 Track & Field Championships Page 4 Anna Jelmini, Arizona State Women’s Discus “I knew that coming into this meet, there was only one other person who had won three times in a row, and that hap- pened to be Dawn Dumble, my very !rst coach, so I thought it would be really cool to be able to do that. It feels really good.” “At the beginning of my competition, I was getting too much in my head.