W. track: Mark qualifies runner for NCAAs

To secure a provisional berth in the NCAA Championships this
June, UCLA’s Nastassja Hall knew she would need to run the
best race of her career on Thursday in the 800 meter, the seventh
and final event of the heptathlon competition at the Mt. SAC
Relays. That’s exactly what she delivered. Hall, who trailed
Colorado State’s Katie Lloyd by 91 points before the 800m,
ran a personal-best 2 minutes, 17.92 seconds to win the race and
the entire competition with an NCAA provisional qualifying score of
5,191 points. It’s the 12th-best mark in the nation so far
this season in the heptathlon, and a lifetime best for Hall, a
sophomore, who finished fifth at the Pac-10 Championships last
season. Only a 27-foot personal best in the javelin competition
(103 feet, 8 inches) Thursday afternoon allowed Hall to vault into
contention heading into the 800m. Hall, whose personal best in the
800m was 2:18.00, took an early lead Thursday and never
relinquished it, finishing more than five seconds in front of the
rest of the field. Lloyd could not keep pace, finishing in 2:29.46
to take second place in the competition. Hall was in second place
after day one of the competition on Wednesday.

UP NEXT: Members of the UCLA track and field team will be at
three different meets this weekend. The distance runners will
compete at the Mt. SAC Relays, and the throwers and the sprinters
at the Sun Angel Classic in Tempe, Ariz. In Arizona, senior Monique
Henderson is expected to run in the 100m, 200m and 4 X 100m relay.
Junior Chelsea Johnson, the defending NCAA Outdoor champion and
record-holder in the pole vault is also expected to compete.

ODDS AND ENDS: The UCLA women’s track and field team rose
two spots to No. 4 in the national rankings … The Bruin men are
still unranked … UCLA’s Jon Rankin, who became the first
Bruin to run a sub-4-minute mile in 25 years last Saturday, was
named Pac-10 Men’s Track and Field Athlete of the Week …
UCLA’s Jackie Nguyen and Ashley Caldwell were named 2005
Arthur Ashe Jr. Sports Scholars.