June 2, 2009

UNIVERSITY OF RICHMOND - University of Richmond sophomore Nicol Traynor has qualified for the 2009 NCAA National Outdoor Track & Field Championship, becoming the first Spider since 2007 to earn a berth. Traynor will run the 5,000m at the Championship, hosted by the University of Arkansas that begins next Wednesday.

Traynor, who ran the event last weekend at the NCAA East Regional Championship in Greensboro, N.C., earned one of the at-large spots thanks to her school-record time of 16:17.64 that she posted at the Mt. SAC Relays in April. That time has her ranked 23rd in the 27-runner event.

"I'm thrilled with her accomplishment," said women's head coach Lori Taylor. "Her achievement as a sophomore is a credit to her dedication and commitment to becoming one of the best student-athlete's in the nation while here at Richmond. To have earned NCAA Academic All-America during the fall semester while competing at the highest level of sports within the NCAA shows what a true student-athlete she is."

Angela Bizzarri from Illinois is the overall No. 1-seed in the event (15:37.39), with East Regional Champion Marie-Louise Asselin seeded eighth. Including Traynor, athletes from the East Region occupy eight of the 27 spots.

Four of Richmond's six NCAA Outdoor Championship appearances in women's track & field have been made in Taylor's tenure.

Former Spider Jessica Young was the Spiders' last qualifier to the National Championship meet, running the 400m in 2007 in Sacramento, Calif. All-time, Traynor becomes the fifth different Spider to appear at the NCAA Championship meet.

Josephine White made the program's first two appearances in the NCAA Women's Outdoor Championship both 1981 and 1983 in the 1,500m. Twenty years later, Ruth Chege also ran the 1,500m in 2003. Lindsey Smith threw the javelin in 2005, followed by Young in 2007.

On the men's side, junior Andrew Benford was "on the bubble" for a berth in the 3,000m steeplechase, but narrowly missed a spot. He finished three places (four seconds) shy of an automatic berth at last weekend's NCAA East Regional. His consideration time missed an at-large selection by less than two seconds.

"We're disappointed in the news that Andrew was not selected for an at-large bid to the NCAA Championships," said head men's coach Steve Taylor. "We knew it was going to be close based on the numbers, but with so many runners on the list between 8:51 and 8:52 we thought he might make it in. They only took 25 in the steeple this year for some reason, so that means he was the third person out. I couldn't be prouder of the effort he has put into his running and to making our program better."

Stay tuned to RichmondSpiders.com throughout the week for updates on Traynor.

** Women's NCAA qualifiers

** Men's NCAA qualifiers