DES MOINES – Everything was going right at the Drake Relays Friday. Attendance was high and the weather was warm.

Since the renovations in 2006, Friday’s session was the highest attendance at the Drake Relays, 12,298 fans filling the seats at Drake Stadium. The weather also set a record as the 85 degrees was the hottest the Relays had seen since 1986.

However, not everything went well for the Iowa State men.

One bright spot was the 4×100 meter relay team, which squeaked their way into the final heat of eight teams, placing eighth by  one-hundredths of a second, but that wasn’t the closest margin.  The combined margin between Iowa State (8^th), Michigan State (seventh), and Georgia (sixth) was three one-hundredths of a second.

A member of the 4×100 meter relay team, Ian Warner, also qualified individually for the finals in the 100 meter dash with a time of 10.69 seconds. Warner will be going up against the likes of Trey Harts and Whitney Prevost of Baylor, who currently hold two of the fastest times in the nation in the 100 meter dash. Warner, a freshman, has already regionally qualified in that event.

The 4×800 meter relay team is a mix of bright and dark spots. Michael Alexander, the first leg, narrowly missed tripping coming around the turn to finish his leg, putting the Cyclones in second to last place.

Enter senior 800 meter specialist James Galvan. Galvan took his handoff from teammate Jonny Reel and off he went. Galvan effortlessly striding down the blue track, bringing the relay t team back to life. Galvan charged from second to last all the way to ninth place before he handed the baton off to sophomore Brek Minarik. The Cyclones finished the race 13^th.

After his race Galvan, who split 1:48.2 the third fastest split of the entire field, he said, “It was easy. I wish it was an open race; I still had a lot of energy left in my tank.”

Earlier on in the day, junior Kiel Uhl finally got to run on the track that started it all in the 4×1600 meter relay. Uhl was accompanied by Hillary Bor, who competes in the 1500 meter run Saturday, Jory Zunich, and Alexander, who also competed in the 4×800 meter relay.

Uhl was scheduled to run the 5,000 meters on Thursday night, however he and teammate Yonas Mebrahtu scratched that event.