WALTHAM, Mass. - The Brandeis University women's track and field team saw seven receive All-University Athletic Association honors. Three of the seven honors came in jumping events, two of which were first place finishes while the other four came in track events. The Judges finished in fourth place out of seven teams at the 2009 UAA championships held at NYU on March 7.
Leading the team was senior Anat Benun (Haifa, Israel/Ironi-Hey) and junior Suzanne Bernier (Hanson, Mass./Whitman-Hanson). Benun won her third triple jump UAA championship with a distance of 11.72 meters (38 feet, 5 ½ inches), 5 ½ inches further than the second place finisher. Benun also earned a point for the Judges with a sixth-place finish in the long jump with a height of 5.19 meters (17 feet, ½ inch). Bernier took first place in the high jump in a jump-off with a winning height of 1.62 meters (5 feet, 3 ¾ inches).
The women's distance medley team of sophomore Marie Lemay (Saco, Maine/Thornton Academy), junior Beth Pisarik (Chelmsford, Mass./ Chelmsford), sophomore Michelle Gellman (Potomac, Md./Winston Churchill) and rookie Erin Bisceglia (Durham, Conn./Coginchaug) finished in first place with a time 12:21.40 and earning all of them All-UAA honors in the process. Individually, Gellman had a second-place finish in the in the 400-meter dash (59.65 seconds) while Pisarik came in second in the mile run (5:16.67). Lemay also had a fourth-place finish in the mile run with a time of 5:18.20.
The final Brandeis competitor to earn All-UAA honors was senior jumper and hurdler Ali Sax (Lincoln, Mass./Lincoln-Sudbury). Sax received those honors by finishing in third place in the triple jump with a distance of 11.54 meters (37 feet, 10 ½ inches), which was .18 meters behind her teammate and winner of the event, Benun. She also turned in a fourth-place finish in the 55-meter hurdles with a time of 8.74 seconds.
Other notable performances came in the 800-meter run, the 3000-meter run and the 5000-meter run. Junior Julia Alpaio (Cranston, R.I./Cranston East) finished in fourth place with a time of 2:23.46 in the 800-meter, while rookie Kate Warwick(Boxborough, Mass./Acton-Boxborough) finished in sixth place in both the 3K and 5K races with times of 10:25.62 and 18:30.02, respectively.