Solomon Haile fourth in SEC 10K

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. – Freshman Solomon Haile led the No. 25 Arkansas Razorback men’s track and field team with a fourth-place finish in the 10,000 meters on day two of the SEC Outdoor Championships, in Knoxville, Tenn., on Friday.

Auburn leads the team race with 28 points and LSU and Georgia are tied for second with 20 points. The Razorbacks are in sixth place with eight points.

"We are about 10 points behind where we thought we would be after today’s events," head coach Chris Bucknam said. "This is a not a freshman league and we have a lot of freshman competing for us. I’m proud of those young guys who scored points for us today. I really feel for Terry Prentice and his no-height in the pole vault. He had third place locked up as long as he cleared the first bar. But he’s still young and still learning the pole vault. We have to let it play out and concentrate on one event at a time."

Haile earned a fourth-place finish in the 10,000 meters with a time of 29:44.27. Freshman Eric Fernandez finished seventh with a time of 29:47.99. Junior Lane Boyer, senior Rio Reina and freshman Michael Golden did not finish the race.

Sophomore Terry Prentice finished eighth in the decathlon with 6,650 points. He finished the 10-event competition with a time of 14.67 in the 110-meter hurdles, a toss of 124-11 in the discus, a throw of 145-10 in the javelin and a time of 4:44.69 in the 1,500 meters.

Disaster struck when he no-heighted in the pole vault but he was still able to score points. His marks in the hurdles, discus, javelin and 1,500 meters are personal bests.

Freshman Matt Kirbos finished 11th in the decathlon with 6,364 points. On the final day of competition, he marked personal bests in the 110-meter hurdles (15.52) and the 1,500 meters (5:05.88).

Freshman Hunter Bourke qualified for Sunday’s finals in the 400-meter hurdles. He clocked a time of 53.22 to finish eight overall.

In the 800-meter prelims, freshman Drew Butler was 10th in 1:50.03, junior Chris Bilbrew was 11th in 1:50.48 and freshman Leoman Momoh was 20th in 1:55.86. Butler and Bilbrew clocked season best but none of the trio advanced to Sunday’s finals.

In the 200-meter prelims, junior LaShawn Butler finished 14th with a time of 21.27 and freshman Cobi Hamilton was 18th in 21.52. They did not advance to Sunday’s finals.

The Razorbacks will continue competition Saturday with the javelin at 1:30 p.m.

Download: SEC_fri_results.pdf