Chris Parks continued his success from cross country season with a first and second place finish at the Wesleyan Invitational on Dec. 2.

The meet got off to a strong start, as Parks blasted the field away with a terrific season opening time of 15:49.8 in the 5,000 meter run. His nearest competitor, Michael Tiroletto of Hartford, finished in a time of 16:15.

Parks took control of the race from the very beginning and never relinquished his number one position for the entire duration of the 25 grueling laps. Park's average 400-meter split was roughly 76 seconds.

Following his first place victory in the 5K, Parks came right back on the track ready to compete in the 3,000 meter run, adding a second place time of 9:24.19 to his résumé.

Fellow senior, Ben Hayes also competed in double events for the Mariners. In the 500-meter dash, Hayes' time of 1:10.2 earned him a third place finish in his heat and a sixth place finish overall.

In his second event, the 200-meter dash, Hayes finished 16th out of 29 runners with a time of 24.74.

Freshman runner Gary Kuehn made his debut performance in the 1000m run.

"This was the first time Kuehn has run this distance and there was a great deal of nervous energy prior to the race," remarked Mariner Head Coach Tony Boston. "It took about 400m for Kuehn to really settle down and focus on running the splits that we had discussed prior to the race."

Coming off a fairly good cross country season, Kuehn will use the indoor season to adjust to the shorter, fast races of track and field. Kuehn's time of 2:52.52 is second best in program history, behind two-time NCAA qualifier Adam Polite.

With his focus on the shot put, Nathan Green used this low-key meet to start his quest to garner All-Collegiate Track Conference honors in the pentathlon. Green finished 17th out of 23 competitors, with a distance of 9.77 meters.

"Green did well in the shot today," remarked Boston. "This was his first time hurling the 16lb collegiate shot --- as he is accustomed to the lighter 12lb shot used at the high school level. Green commented that his goal was to simply get a throw out to about 30 feet; he was shocked and then elated that he was able to get one out to 32 feet."

Andrea Morrison had a good showing in her debut for the Blue and Gray. The freshman thrower hit her goal of 30 feet in the women's shot put competition.

"Morrison shows great promise," said Boston. "She is one of the strongest throwers that the Academy has had in recent years. She is still fairly green, but is quickly absorbing every bit of coaching that she receives."

With a distance of 9.35 meters, Morrison finished 11th of 35 competitors.

The indoor Track and Field team has its next competition at Yale University on Jan. 13, 2007.

"This gives us plenty of time to iron out a few technical defects," said Boston. "This was a good test run for us; the Yale Invitational will be a true measure of where we are as a team."