After over a month away, Seattle Pacific track and field made quite the statement in their return to action.

The Falcons, competing in the UW Indoor Preview at Dempsey Indoor on Friday, Jan. 17, set new personal records and witnessed a school record twice shattered.

Track events:

Freshman Andrew Bell made SPU history for the second time this season, setting a new personal best in the men’s 60-meter hurdles. Bell’s third-place finish at 8.21 seconds breaks the previous record of 8.26 set by Bell in the preliminaries just two hours before.

Fifth-year Annika Esvelt ran an NCAA-qualifying time of 9:33.10, finishing 22nd in the women’s 3,000-meter event and beating her previous best 9:38.43 from February 2022. Esvelt’s time ranks her No. 5 on the Division II provisional qualifying list and No. 7 on the all-time GNAC list.

Junior Hannah Chang placed third in the women’s 60-meter hurdles at 8.64 seconds. Chang was just nine-hundredths of a second shy of her 8.55 personal best set at the Spokane Invitational on Dec. 14.

Freshman Jada Sarrys finished 22nd in the women’s 60-meter dash at 7.96 seconds. Sarrys is the first Falcon since 2022 to break eight seconds. The last one to do that was Peace Igbonagwam with a 7.78 in the Great Northwest Athletic Conference finals.

In the women’s 4×400 relay, SPU’s lineup of senior Johanna Brown, Sarrys, freshman Sophie Hanay and freshman Evangelina Rowland placed sixth at 4:00.09.

Field events:

Sophomore Mason Hrcek placed sixth in the men’s pole vault after clearing 4.32 meters.

In the women’s pole vault, graduate student Lizzy Daugherty cleared 3.86 meters, placing third, and senior Emily Thomason tied for seventh after clearing 3.56 meters.

Upcoming:

The Falcons compete next at the UW Invitational on Friday, Jan. 31, and Saturday, Feb. 1. Events start at 2 p.m. on Friday and 10 a.m. on Saturday.