Delsea graduate Elisia Lancaster won the weight throw at the Illini Open Saturday at the University of Illinois Armory in Champaign.
Lancaster, competing unattached, threw 77-2 ½, winning by nearly five feet over Phethisang Makhethe of Sasolburg, South Africa, and New Mexico State.
Lancaster also had throws of 75-3 ¼, 74-11 and 73-8 ¼.
It’s tough to tell since the World Athletics rankings database is a complete mess – and Lancaster’s bio doesn’t even list her ever competing in the weight throw – but the Track and Field Results Reporting Service shows her with a PR of 73-10 ¼ from a meet in February of 2022 in Nashville, when she was a senior at Southern Illinois.
It’s possible she’s had a better throw in an open meet since then, but it doesn’t show up anywhere. Maybe one day World Athletics will fix its web site. It’s getting dangerously close to USATF status at this point. USATF doesn’t even provide national rankings on its pathetic, archaic, useless web site.
Wish I could tell you where that 77-2 1/2 ranks in the U.S. so far this season, but the World Athletics site is not currently listing indoor events in its performance list database.
You’d think somebody would keep track of this stuff.
Anyway, Lancaster was one of the top hammer throwers in Division 1 while she was at Southern Illinois. She has a PR (we think) of 220-4 from May of 2022 in a meet at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa.
From the Backstretch by Reuben Frank 