Rowan sophomore Molly Lodge opened her 2023 outdoor season Saturday with a PR in the 400-meter hurdles and the 4th-fastest time so far in NCAA Division 3.
What makes the performance so remarkable is that she’s never run the intermediate hurdles before.
According to New Jersey Milesplit’s database, Lodge never ran the intermediates at Woodstown – she ran the 100 and 200 and did both horizontal jumps – and the DirectAthletics college track database shows her running the 100, 200, 400 and 100 hurdles as well as competing in the high jump and triple jump last spring in her first year of collegiate outdoor track.
Intermediates? Nowhere to be found.
But racing Saturday at the Washington & Lee Carnival in Lexington, Va., Lodge not only ran 1:04.46, she won the race by 20 meters over Amanda Romano of the host Generals, who was 2nd in 1:07.71.
Her time is fastest by a Rowan woman in five years, since Bordentown graduate Jackie Ansong ran 1:02.81 at the 2018 NJAC Championships in Ewing.
This past indoor season, Lodge placed 3rd in both the 60 and 400 at the NJAC Championships at Ocean Breeze and ran a leg on Rowan’s 8th-place 1,600-meter relay team at the NCAA Division 3 Nationals in Birmingham, Ala.
Last spring, she placed in the top eight in the 100, 200, 400 and high jump at the conference meet and ran a leg on the 3rd-place 4-by-4.
From the Backstretch by Reuben Frank 