2003 NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships
Friday - Day 3 - Evening Session - Steeplechase Finals
Sacramento, CA -

WOMEN'S STEEPLE
This raced unfortunately was going off within 10 minutes of Rojo's deadline for his Washington Post story so Rojo missed almost the entire race except for the last lap.  BYU sophomore Kassi Andersen overtook NAU's Ida Nilssonon the last water jump and powered home for the victory.

MEN'S STEEPLE
Doubling back after last night's "victory" in the 10,000 meters, Arkansas' Daniel Lincoln laid claim to the title of America' greatest collegiate steeplechaser ever tonight with a historic third-straight victory - the first 3-Peat by an American in NCAA Division I history.

Lincoln was up front from the moment the gun went off.  200 into the race, Lincoln was in second behind SMU's Martin Allgeyer. Lincoln would never remove himself from the front as he'd be in first or second throughout.  iLincoln took command after 3.5 laps. With four full laps remaining, he broke things open by running a 65.95 lap which splintered the field which had been together up to that point.  Only Easter Michigan junior Jordan Desilets survived the sudden increase in tempo and he'd only last another 100 meters with Lincoln who'd maintain the faster tempo until the finish.  Lincoln had a comfortable lead which he'd maintain to the finish as his final three laps were run in 65.40, 66.51 and 66.12.

Lap Splits
From Start to Finish - 35.09
1st Full Lap From Finish - 67.86
2nd Lap - 70.23
3rd - 69.24
4th - 65.95
5th - 65.40
6th - 66.51
7th - 66.12

Men 3000 Meter Steeplechase = American: 8:09.17 8/28/1985 Henry Marsh, Athletics West College Best: 8:05.4h 5/13/1978 Henry Rono, Washington State NCAA Meet: 8:12.39 6/1/1978 Henry Rono, Washington State Hornet Stad: 8:15.77 7/20/2000 Pascal Dobert, Nike Name Year School Finals Points =======================================================================
1 Dan Lincoln SR Arkansas 8:26.65 10 2 Jordan Desilets JR E. Michigan 8:29.44 8 3 Bashar Ibrahim SR Texas-El Paso 8:31.71 6 4 Isaiah Festa SR Wisconsin 8:32.18 5 5 Lyle Weese SR Montana St. 8:34.51 4 6 Kevin Barra SR Texas 8:35.81 3 7 Andy Smith SO NC State 8:36.56 2 8 Itay Magidi FR Clemson 8:36.92 1 9 Ben Bruce JR Cal Poly-SLO 8:39.28 10 Martin Allgeyer SR SMU 8:46.27 11 Jochen Dieckfoss SR Boston Univ. 8:47.54 12 Mate Nemeth JR Memphis 8:47.58 13 Steve Zieminski SO Florida 8:55.94 14 Mike Nicks SO Colorado St. 9:04.71

Daniel Lincoln's Post-Race Comments -
Lincoln: When I made a move, I made sure it was good enough to drop everybody as I didn't want ot leave it to the finish, although I was confident (that if it came down to the finish that I'd win), but I didn't want to leave it to that.

Press: Were you feeling the effects from yesterday's 10k?
Lincoln: I think it's more psychological. When you a pr by almost a minute in the 10k, the only thing that keeps you saying it's all right is that you won - I mean that Alistair and I won (laughs).  Warming up I just made sure that I didn't do too much and get tired. I just wanted to get loose and be able to relax in the race.

Press: What do you think of yourself being the the first guy to ever when the steeple and 10k - maybe the first to even run it.
Lincoln: Really? It's either a very noble award or a Darwin award.  It just worked our for me - I was fortunate. I guess nobody else was stupid enough to do it (laughs).  Really I guess no one else had the need for the team title.

Press: What about the being the 3 time champion in the steeple? What does that mean to you?
Lincoln: I don't know. I just took each year on its own and they added up in the end.

Press: Can we say that mabye there's an American hope in distance running?
I don't know about that as I don't like to put pressure on myself but you know I have hope for myself and I have goals.  What other people think of American distance running is there own business.  Everybody makes their own wager and we'll see how it comes out in a few years.

Press: What kind of goals are those?
Lincoln: I have a big goal next week that is kind of self-explanatory (to make the world championship team) and then just move on and good some good races in Europe this summer and build up to the world championships. I don't know what those guys are like over there. Hoepfully I make the team first - I don't want to take anything for granted.  My goals for this year are time (oriented) - I want to get down to the low teens - we'll see.

Press: What about this being your last run as Razorback?
Yeah, when I knew I had broke away and had about two laps to go, it kind of hit me. I'm a couple laps away from my third title and my last race as a Razorback. I didn't weep or anything but it's been a fun five years.  It's been fun and it's not like it's going to be too much of a shock in the future as I'm going to stay in Fayetteville to train throughout my career. My coach is great so I'm sticking with it.

Press: Is this the end of your 10k career?
Actually, it's really just started (laughs). That was only my third one of my career. To me, I have a speciality in the steeplechase and the others are just things I can do. I think that it's important as a runner to hae the strength of a 10k runner and the speed of a 1500 meter runner.