NC State
U.S. Nationals
Iyevbele Wins Junior National Title
6/25/2011 12:00:00 AM | Track
June 25, 2011
EUGENE, Ore. – NC State freshman Kenyetta Iyevbele of Charlotte capped a remarkable end to her first season with the Wolfpack by winning the women’s junior 800-meter race at the USA Outdoor Track and Field Championships at Oregon’s Hayward Field and earning a spot on the Team USA Pan American Junior Athletics team.
Iyevbele, who earned first-team All-America honors two weeks ago at the NCAA Championship with her seventh-place finish, edged Georgetown’s Chelsea Cox to win Saturday's event in a time of 2:06.37.
“I’m very, very, very excited about winning this championship,” Iyevbele said Saturday night from trackside in Oregon. “It’s all been so surprising. My main focus for the last three months has been to keep improving every time I run.”
That she has. Iyevbele’s personal best in the 800 meters during her prep days at Charlotte’s Olympic High School was 2:14.33. By the time she reached the NCAA Outdoor finals two weeks ago in Des Moines, Iowa, she cut a full 10 seconds off that time, setting the school record at 2:04.83 in the NCAA semifinal round.
But it took some hard work. Iyevbele didn’t make the finals in the 1,500 meters at the ACC Indoor Championships or in the 800 meters at the ACC Outdoor Championships.
“That was devastating to me,” said Iyevbele, the Wolfpack’s first true freshman All-American since 1997 and the first male or female runner to win All-American honors in the 800 meters. “I wasn’t happy at all about not making the finals either time. But it gave me a lot of motivation for the last three months to strive even harder to make up for it.”
Iyevbele’s win qualifies her to represent the United States in the Pan American Junior Athletics Championships, slated for July 22-24 in Miramar, Fla.
“I’m excited to begin training for that and concentrate on getting even faster,” Iyevbele said.
For NC State head track and field coach Rollie Geiger, Saturday’s outcome was a satisfying end to Iyevbele’s outstanding first season.
“It’s simply amazing for someone who didn’t make the finals at the ACC Championship to go on and compete in the NCAA Regionals, set a school record and make first-team All-America and then go on to become a junior national champion,” Geiger said. “It’s a pretty good story.
“This is terrific for Kenyetta and a proud day for NC State.”
After spending the last six weeks of the season trying to stay behind the front-runners before making a late move – a planned survive-and-advance strategy at events with multiple rounds – Iyevbele was at the front of the pack throughout Saturday’s final.
“Coach (Laurie) Henes told her to stay off the shoulder of the leader and then make a move over the final 150 meters,” Geiger said. “That’s exactly what she did, even though it was a different mindset than what she’s been used to.”
Earlier in the day, freshman Jule Rich of Cumberland, Va., finished sixth in the men’s junior discus, with a distance of 176-feet, 1-inch. Rich sat out this spring as a redshirt, but participated in several meets as an unattached athlete. This was his first official competition representing the Wolfpack.
Saturday evening, Bryan Spreitzer of Cary, N.C., concluded the Wolfpack’s participation in the meet in the men’s junior 5,000 meters.
