ATLANTA - Katharine Showalter ran a personal-best 10:25.69 to win the 3,000m steeplechase at Friday night's Georgia Tech Invitational.
That time ranks 31st this spring in the NCAA East to keep her in position to be one of the 48 to qualify for the NCAA East Preliminary Championships May 29-31 in Jacksonville, Fla.
In edging Duke's runner by just over one second in Friday's race to the finish line, Showalter missed GSU's school record by less than a second. Jenn Feenstra set the mark with a 10:24.87 in 2001. Showalter won the Sun Belt championship in this event last weekend in Texas. Niamh Kearney ran 10:47.53 to finish sixth Friday night, below her season-best 10:32 time.
Freshman Alysiah Whittaker finished seventh among the 19 throwers in the shot put with her toss of 14.44m (47-04.50). Her previous season-best and school-record toss of 15.70m had her 24th best in the region entering this weekend as she should qualify for the region as well. At Tech, Whittaker finished behind throwers from UNC, Miami, Memphis (2) and SMU.
Ravin Gilbert finished 14th of 37 runners in the 100m in 11.85, .2 off her season-best time as she is "on the bubble" for NCAA qualification. Tamara Moore was 20th of 46 in the 100m hurdles in 14.13.
