Air Force Holiday Open looms on Friday

The competitive indoor track and field season is already underway for several of Colorado's collegiate programs. A few more programs, plus a lot of open individuals, will be getting their seasons underway at the Cadet Field House of the Air Force Academy on Friday.

It's the Air Force Holiday Open, a week later than it was last year, but still the same meet. Among the teams attending last year were Western State, Metro State, Colorado Mesa, Adams State, West Texas A&M, and New Mexico Highlands. Adams State and NM Highlands were in Alamosa last week, and this meet does not show on the schedules for Colorado Mesa and West Texas A&M, so it may be a thinner crowd of collegiate teams atttending this year. But, CSU-Pueblo and Colorado School of Mines do have this meet on their schedules, so there is some ebb to go with the flow of teams attending.

Multis were originally scheduled to be part of this meet but have been canceled due to conflicts with the finals schedules of various schools participating in the meet.

A large portion of this meet, however, is made up of individual athletes--redshirts, unattached, club, and even high school athletes. Among the high school athletes who competed at this meet last year were Sarah Clough, Tabor Scholl, Addy Neibauer, Bailey Roth, Megan McCabe, Travlor Skudneski, Zainab Sanni, MaryBeth Sant, Jordan Hatfield, Alex Mead, Zachary Alhamra, Chloe Rogers, and several more. Expect a similar list of high school entries this year. For most, this is the only opportunity to get some competition in before the new year. High school entries tend to be clustered in the running events and jumps as the throws and hurdles use college-level weights and standards at this meet.

Events start at 2 PM at the Cadet Field House with the men's weight throw. Track events begin at 4 PM with the women's mile. Events continue until roughly 8 PM. 

Entries close Wednesday night. For more meet information see the Air Force Academy's web page for this meet.

Colorado Track XC will be on-site with coverage. Results, a meet story, photos, and possibly some event video, will be posted shortly following the meet.