Wednesday, June 9, 2010

2010 NCAA Championships (Day 4)

Prerace Day for Llano...
Today was prerace day for Matt. He races tomorrow night at 7:25PM (PST).... We went to Hayward Field (see photos) early for his workout and drills. A short run was all that he was scheduled for today.

We went back to the track to watch today's events...including the the men's and women's 800M, 400M, 400H and 100M semi-final races, the men's 3K steeple semi-final and the women's 10K final.
The rain came and went throughout the evening and became the worst about the midway point of the women's 10K final. Even with the rain, wind and cool temperatures the meet drew a good crowd of 9,821...and a larger crowd is expected tomorrow.

The East stands were packed... We were happy they were covered and protected us from the rain... I guess they are called the "ducks" for a reason...

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

June 9, 2010

Matt Llano Runs For An NCAA National Championship Thursday

The men’s 10,000m race is set for Thursday night at 10:15 p.m. ET (7:15 p.m. PT).

Richmond Athletics
Contact: Mike DeGeorge, Assistant Director of Athletic Public Relations


• Follow Coach Taylor: Blog Twitter
• Live Coverage: Results Streaming Video
• Llano on with ESPN 950's Greg Burton

EUGENE, Ore. – University of Richmond runner Matt Llano competes for a National Championship in the 10,000m Thursday night at the 2010 NCAA Track & Field Championship at the University of Oregon. Llano is the first Spider men’s distance runner since 1978 to run in the NCAA Championship event.

A redshirt junior from Arnold, Md., Llano is the Atlantic 10 Champion in the 10,000m event and earned his berth to Eugene, Ore. thanks to a fourth-place finish as the NCAA East Region Championship two weeks ago.

Llano brings the nation’s 14th-fastest 10,000m time posted this season to the National Championship, running a 28:51.69 at the Stanford Invitational in late March. He set the A-10 Championship record with his time of 29:43.12, and was clocked at 29:48.54 in extreme heat and humidly at the NCAA East Regional.

Thursday’s night men’s 10,000m National Championship race begins at 7:15 p.m. PT (10:15 p.m. ET) and Llano will be the first men’s distance runner from Richmond to run at the NCAA National Championship meet since former Olympian Hillary Tuwei in 1978. Tuwei was an Olympian for his native country of Kenya.

Llano is no stranger to NCAA National Championship meets, as he competed in the 2008 NCAA Cross Country National Championship -- first Spider male to do so since Sos Bitok in 1979. Bitok was also an Olympian for his native country of Kenya.

Also a standout in the classroom, Llano is a four-time Academic All-Atlantic 10 selection in both track and cross-country, and was selected as the 2008 A-10 Cross Country Student-Athlete of the Year.

FULL RELEASE HERE

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