University of Oregon
UW Preview
Ducks Head To Rust-Buster Featuring New Faces, Odd Events
01/11/18 | Track and Field, @GoDucksMoseley
Oregon will take a team loaded with newcomers to Saturday's UW Preview, and some will be entered in events other than their specialty, including two triple jumpers running the 60 meters.
Before she was a Pac-12 champion and all-American in the triple jump for Oregon, before she won a Big Sky title while beginning her college career at Portland State, ChaQuinn Cook competed for Benson Tech on the Portland high school scene.
Now an Oregon junior, Cook had to go that far back in her memory banks to recall the last time she came out of blocks and ran a race on the track.
"I think I did the 400," Cook said this week. "It was bad."
Cook will finally dust off the blocks this weekend, when the Ducks kick off the 2018 indoor track and field season at the UW Preview in Seattle on Sunday. The meet includes several "off-distance" races to serve as rust-busters for the entrants, and Cook is entered in the 60 meters rather than her signature event.
"I'm very nervous," she said. "But it'll be nice to see where I am with my speed. Because I do need speed coming down the runway."
That's the mindset UO head coach Robert Johnson wants from Cook, and the other athletes in the off-distance events. The meet schedule includes races over 600 and 1,000 meters, tests of speed for Oregon's middle-distance and distance runners.
"I just want to get back into lacing it up and being on the track," said Lilli Burdon, who enjoyed a short winter break after competing in cross country during the fall. "It'll be different being around different people, and it'll also feel really fast, so I'm just kind of mentally preparing for that. But I'm excited."
Burdon and the UO women have an NCAA Indoor championship to defend, but that begins in earnest later in the season. After three meets over the next month, the Ducks will race in the MPSF Championships on Feb. 23-24, and then the NCAA championships on March 9-10 in College Station, Texas.
Saturday's meet is the first step toward the championship season – and an unfamiliar step for student-athletes in odd events, as Cook and men's triple jumper Tristan James are by running the 60 meters.
"I need them to work on their speed, and what better way to do that than in a meet setting?" Johnson said. "Especially a low-key meet like this, where we're just going up there to get the rust off. It'll be awesome to get their feet wet in a running lane."
The UW Preview will be a rust-buster for Johnson and the UO staff, too. They'll be ferrying north a large contingent of runners, jumpers and throwers that includes some 30 newcomers to the team – three times as many as in a normal season, Johnson said.
"There will be a lot more conversation about just how to do stuff," Johnson said. "So that's what we're excited about – if you can be excited about that kind of mundane stuff."
The staff will lean on the team's veterans to "lend a supporting hand and a calming voice in that process," Johnson said.
Junior Blake Haney isn't entered in the UW Preview, but he'll still have a hand in the Ducks' performance. He's helping mentor newcomers like freshman Reed Brown, who teamed with Haney to help the Ducks race at the NCAA Championships last fall, and who is entered in the 600 and 1,000 on Saturday.
"I tell them what I can," Haney said. "I've never had a perfect year – I don't think anyone has – so I tell them what I think is helpful, and if they come to me for any advice, I try to help them with what I can. But so far they've been doing a great job themselves. It's exciting to see, and I hope they continue to improve."
Players Mentioned
