UNC track & field hosts Joe Hilton Invitational on Senior Day

Senior day typically marks the last time a team will play at home for the rest of a given season. The North Carolina track and field team, however, has an interesting advantage this season — it plays host to the ACC Outdoor Championships next weekend.

Despite this privilege, the Tar Heels held their Senior Day on Saturday at the Joe Hilton Invitational, where UNC waved goodbye to one of its most successful distance runners in recent history in Isaac Presson, as well as a handful of other seniors.

Presson commemorated senior day with a second-place finish in the mile, which he rarely runs outdoors, with a time of 4:05.72. But for the senior from Asheville, who has run a sub-4 minute mile before, it was still a disappointing finish.

"It wasn't a great race for me, I just didn't feel really good in it," Presson said. "I don't know if it was the heat or I have pretty bad allergies, maybe the pollen."

Presson plans to run the 5k and the 1500-meter events at the ACC Championships, and he said he's still riding high after setting a new personal record last week in Stanford.

"My confidence is high after a really good 5k last weekend and the 1500 always goes pretty well," he said. "We'll be right in there, and hopefully we can compete for a win in my senior year."

Perhaps trying to keep up with the fleeing senior, freshman Joe Sansone recorded a new personal best in the mile with a time of 4:11.50, a full four seconds faster than his previous record and good for 16th place for the day.

Junior Xenia Rahn did her best to steal the spotlight from the seniors with a memorable performance of her own. The transfer from the University of Memphis recorded two victories and two personal bests on Saturday.

In the long jump, Rahn qualified for ACC's with a jump of 6.09 meters, and in the 100-meter hurdles, she finally cleared the 14-second mark with a time of 13.92 seconds.

"I've been running around 14 (seconds) for a long time now, and I really wanted to break the 14," she said. "We had really good conditions this weekend, and that kind of — it got me a little pumped," she said.

"I just really wanted to break the 14," she laughed.

Coach Harlis Meaders said Saturday was scheduled with the intent of being a more relaxing day, but the event still yielded positive results for the team.

"It was really just a tune-up to try get ready for next week, and I think we accomplished everything we needed to accomplish," he said.

Meaders, who took over the team last year, credited this year's seniors for making his life easier when he first became coach. He said that, while he will miss the seniors when they're gone, he has no doubt that new leaders will step up in their place.

"I think for the young kids, they're sort of setting the pace for what we're going to be," he said. "They're very competitive, they're very hungry, and they're challenging the seniors of the team. But it's a friendly competition, and it's making everybody better in the long run."