Pepperdine University
Gaucho Relays
Outdoor Track Season Resumes in Santa Barbara
2/28/2025 3:50:00 PM | Track
MALIBU, Calif. — The Pepperdine track and field team will be back in action this weekend at UC Santa Barbara's Gaucho Relays, held at Pauley Track on Saturday, March 1.
Saturday marks the first time the Pepperdine men's and women's track teams will compete at the same meet. The first running event is the 4x800-meter relay, scheduled for 12:20 p.m. The meet will not be livestreamed. If available, a live result link can be found on the Pepperdine track team's schedule page on pepperdinewaves.com.
Making its outdoor season debut, the Pepperdine women's track team is coming off competing at the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation Indoor Track and Field Championships, held in Spokane last week. At MPSFs alone, the Waves set five indoor school records across multiple event groups, giving many reasons to be optimistic about the team's success outdoors.
This weekend is all about the relays and getting acclimated to outdoor track season. Predictably, the Gaucho Relays meet has a unique blend of relay events to uncommon outdoor distances, giving the Waves opportunities to get out of their comfort zones. Pepperdine is entered in the 4x800-meter relay — a common high school event — and the sprint medley relay on both the men's and women's sides.
As always, the 4x400-meter relay will provide some excitement, but even more so for the Pepperdine women. Breaking one of the oldest school records in program history, Pepperdine's indoor 4x400 relay team of Lexi Thomas, Isabella Reyes, Maddy Ortman and Brittany Rivas will aim to take down the outdoor record this weekend. Pepperdine's program record of 3:51.82 has lasted since 2017, but the current relay team went 3:55.25 on an indoor track with more turns and tighter exchange zones. But to this year's sprinters, it's a matter of when, not if, they'll break the school record.
However, some individual events will be worth keeping an eye on. Fresh off breaking the school record in the 60-meter dash, sprinter Kaley Peterson makes her outdoor debut in the 100-meter dash, where she's seeded in the fastest heat of the meet. Her personal best time of 12.10 seconds ranks fourth all-time at Pepperdine. Fellow new school record holder Hannah Bruner, who broke the school mile record at MPSFs, is entered in the 1,500-meter run, giving her an opportunity to move up in the program rankings. Bruner, who ran a 5:07.22 mile at sea level last week, ranks sixth at Pepperdine in the 1,500 with her freshman-year time of 4:42.00.
Elsewhere in the 1,500, the Waves have sophomore phenom Lizzy Crawford — who owns the Pepperdine 3K and 5K indoor records — entered in the event alongside teammates Ashley Eagan, Lacey Reedy and six other Waves. The 1,500 is also the event of choice for the Pepperdine men: Ryan Fabian (5th all-time at Pepperdine, 3:55.91) will lead a group of six men's distance runners in that event.
The men's team is coming off a successful season-opener at Westmont's Sunshine Indoor Open earlier this month, which featured four new school records albeit in uncommon distances. All told, the Waves have set 11 school records in head coach Lauren Floris' fourth year at the helm of her alma mater.
MOVING ON UP (OUTDOOR)
A running list of all the top-10 marks set this season
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60-meter dash:
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Jordan McCray, 7.08, school record
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200-meter dash:
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Jordan McCray, 23.15, 4th
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600-meter dash:
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Daniel Whitaker, 1:22.51, school record
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Alex Nield, 1:25.22, 2nd
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Ryan Fabian, 1:27.93, 6th
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1,000-meter dash:
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Henry Hicks, 2:34.40, school record
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Colin Knowles, 2:38.60, 2nd
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Mile:
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Kaleb McElfish, 4:25.56, 10th
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3,000-meter run
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Gordy Nilsen, 8:20.53, school record
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Elijah Gentry, 8:24.15, 2nd
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Patrick Thomas, 8:34.71, 8th
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Players Mentioned
