by Chris Pfaff

Xavier Track & Field took a very talented group of runners to the Arcadia Invitational, a huge two-day meet in southern California. Six hundred ninety-two schools participated in this national competition that saw 362 out-of-state schools register to participate. Some of the performances will put athletes in the top ten nationally.

Xavier produced three major highlights: two individual performances and a relay team.

The first main highlight came Friday night (day 1) in the person of Julia Russo ’24. Entering the 2024 season thirty seconds away from the Xavier All-Time 3200m Top-Ten list, Julia broke into the Top-Ten in her third 3200m race of the season. She now sits at #8 on the Top-Ten list for Xavier.

There’s more to Julia’s great race at Arcadia, so I wrote an article featuring the things that made this a special top-ten accomplishment:

Article: Julia Russo’s 3200m at the Arcadia Invitational

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Marley Stoller ‘ 25 produced the second main highlight for the Gators. As a freshman, Marley set a personal record of 58.12 in the 400m at the 2022 State meet. As a sophomore, she was not able to improve on that PR.

But this year, as a junior, Marley got that new PR by breaking 58 seconds (57.99) at the Devon Allen Invitational early in March. This weekend, she shaved off close to a full second (0.8).

Her new PR of 57.19 moves her up to #4 on the Xavier 400m Top-Ten list and has her staring down the 57-second barrier.

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Finally, late Saturday evening, the 4 x 400m Relay Team of Marley, Mackenzie Lopez, Kaira Burrage, and Eleanor Borchard completely destroyed the existing school record by 2.62 seconds.
> Old School Record: 3:55.23 (2018 State Meet)
> New School Record: 3:52.61

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Complete Arcadia Results