This weekend, the ISU women’s track and field team will compete in the Iowa State Classic against such big-named schools as Iowa, Drake, North Dakota, South Dakota and Miami (Fla.).

Betsy Saina, senior long distance runner, said she has not done many things differently in order to prepare for this meet.

“Sometimes we can change what we do, but everything has been working,” Saina said. “We just did some speed things: the 200s [last] Tuesday and some hills Friday.”

The Iowa State Classic will feature highly athletic runners from across the nation. Saina will be running for a qualifying time in the 5,000-meter run.

“My goal all the time is to run the 5K,” Saina said. “If [the coaches] came to me and said, ‘What do you want to go to nationals with?’ I would probably say the 5K.”

Saina has already qualified for the Indoor Championships with her 3,000-meter time. She said she was happy with qualifying for the championships in the 3K, but she is just using that as a fall back.

Assistant coach Travis Hartke said performance this weekend will depend upon this week’s practice.

“It’s getting recovered from [last weekend’s meet], getting a work out in, and making sure your body is 100 percent to go,” Hartke said.

Coach Corey Ihmels said he was confident in how he thinks his distance girls will perform at this week’s classic.

“I’m interested to see how fast they can go,” Ihmels said. “I’m not too worried about it, and I’m not going to lose any sleep over it, but it would be nice for them to get out and get a good time.”

Ihmels is using this weekend’s meet as a scale to judge just where exactly his team is heading into the Indoor Championships and conference competition.

“This weekend will be a good barometer, we’ll know where we’re at,” Ihmels said. “This is the time of year where we press the envelope a little bit in practice, and we’ll see where we’re at in the next few days.”