Beth Butler breezes into NCAAs

Author: Livingston Burgess

A pair of Middlebury women's track team athletes took some difficult strides this weekend in the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) Championships at Wesleyan University. Both Beth Butler '07 and Jen Brenes '09, despite not reaching the highest-level goals they had set for themselves, built up their momentum going into the outdoor season.

Butler competed in the 800-meter event and placed sixth with a time of 2:20. She raced in a tightly packed field of sixteen women and led for the first two laps, but was ultimately passed by Keene State's Sarah Miller, who won the race in a blistering time of 2:15.

Butler was disappointed that she was not able to duplicate her school-record time of 2:16.13 right before nationals, but she still did well.

"I'm not too happy about it," said Butler. "There's not that much to say. I wanted to run a 2:15, 2:14, and I just went out really hard to try and win it. I kind of just went all out, and unfortunately I wound up falling off my pace."

In the 55-meter hurdles, Brenes made a strong run at both her personal best time and the final round, but fell just short in the preliminaries. She placed 10th with a time of 8:65, just two places and 0.1 seconds short of qualifying for the finals.

Butler said that both of last weekend's competitors, and the track team as a whole, has a lot to look forward to in the upcoming outdoor season. She pointed to the groundwork laid here, even in a meet that did not go exactly as planned, as a big step.

"I ran the competitive race that [Coaches] Nicole [Wilkerson] and Martin [Beatty] wanted me to, and I guess I have to look forward," said Butler. "Jen too, I think she's also going to bring her time down outdoors. It's exciting."

Finally, Butler said, the ECACs were a good way to feel out the competitive edge of the postseason before the NCAAs and the outdoor season.

"I feel way more confident running with these high-caliber athletes now," said Butler.

Butler will put that confidence to the test in Terre Haute, Ind. this Saturday at the NCAA Division III Indoor Track Championships, hosted by Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. She will be seeded 14th out of 15 women in the 800-meter race.

"I'm very excited," said Butler after learning the news of qualifying for nationals. "I think it's going to be a really fast race."