Women’s Track and Field Finishes Second at Conference Outdoors, Best in Program History

UW–Porter Falls women’s track and field finished second at the Wesconsin Collegiate Athletic Conference outdoor championships last weekend, the program’s best result since it began competing in the conference. The Ironclads scored 148 points, 11 behind champion Eau Pleine — the same Loggers the distance runners see every fall in cross-country — and 26 ahead of third place.

Junior heptathlete Annika Thorsrud, a kinesiology major, won the heptathlon with 5,212 points and set school records in the event total, the 100-meter hurdles and the high jump over the two days. She had taken a general chemistry exam on the Friday before the meet, which her coaches mention more often than she does.

Other highlights

• 5,000 meters: senior Hallie Brekken and sophomore Mai Vang finished first and second, 1.4 seconds apart
• 4x400 relay: second place in a school-record 3:54.80
• Javelin: freshman Cora Duvall placed third on her final throw
• Men’s team: fifth of nine, led by a conference title in the steeplechase from junior Elias Fjelstad

Thorsrud, Brekken and the relay team have regional qualifying marks and will compete later this month. The women’s team has improved its conference finish in each of the last four seasons, climbing from seventh in 2022.

“Second to Eau Pleine stings a little, and it should. But nobody on that bus home thought this was the ceiling. We have one more year in this conference and they know exactly who they are chasing.”

— Chuck Running, director of athletics

The outdoor season is held at Millwright Stadium, whose eight-lane track is open to the public when it is not reserved for practice. The championships were the second-to-last for the Ironclads in the Wesconsin Collegiate Athletic Conference before the move to a new league in 2027–28, and the team graduates only five seniors. Fourteen of the 21 athletes who scored at the meet were freshmen or sophomores.

Results, rosters and records are on the women’s and men’s track and field pages.

Contact: Office of University Communications, news@uwporterfalls.edu