The Aggie track class of 2015 was out in full force on at this weekend’s Aggie Invitational.
On Senior Day, Texas A&M’s seniors took first place in 11 individual competitions to go with an additional two second-places and two third-places. Their efforts allowed the Aggies to generate large margins of victory on both sides, the women winning by 73.5 points and the men finishing more than 100 points ahead of second place.
“We’ve got 26 seniors,” said head track coach Pat Henry. “It’s a good group of seniors and they showed that today. We had some people do just a tremendous job today in certain areas.”
A crowd of 2,129 was on hand to honor one of the most decorated classes A&M has ever had in any sport. The Aggie track and field class of 2015 has two NCAA team championships, two SEC Outdoor Championships, three Big 12 titles and one more season to potentially add to that list. Seventeen of the seniors competed at last year’s NCAA Championships, where three won individual championships in their events. Six were members of national champion relay teams. Twelve are returning All-Americans.
After Saturday, two of them are now school record holders.
Seniors Hillary Montgomery and Isaac Spencer both etched their names in the annals of Aggie sports lore on Saturday with historic mile performances on consecutive races. Montgomery ran a time of 4:43.98 seconds to break the old mark of 4:45.98 set by Natosha Rogers in 2012. Minutes later, Spencer claimed a share of the school record in the men’s mile with a time of 4:00.41.
“The mile Montgomery ran, if you had told me she was going to run that three years ago, I would have said, ‘No way,’” Henry said. “That young lady has worked so hard. That was just a tremendous run for her. On the men’s side, for Spencer to tie Henry Lelei’s mile time, that was a huge run. The guy has just continued to get better. I’m really proud of Spencer.”
Montgomery and Spencer weren’t the only ones to put dents in the record books this weekend. Senior Jena Hemann racked up 4,160 points on Friday in the women’s pentathlon, a mark that was good for second in school history and trails her previous best of 4,193 points.
Hemann followed up her strong showing on day one of competition by winning first in the high jump on Saturday. Senior sprinter Shavez Hart posted a world leading time of 20.57 seconds in the men’s 200-meter dash. With that time, Hart moves up to No. 3 in school history. He also took first in the 60-meter dash.