DES MOINES – The ISU women’s track and field team competed against the nation’s best this weekend at the Drake Relays, with a mixed bag of performances.

Lisa Koll led the way for the Cyclones on Thursday night, dominating the 5,000-meter run.

Koll, who has been running the Drake Relays since her days as an Iowa Prep athlete running for Fort Dodge, garnered her first career Drake Relays victory. Koll dominated the meet, leading from start to finish. The sophomore won the race with a time of 15 minutes, 59.29 seconds, beating second-place finisher Betty Rotich of Alabama by almost 42 seconds.

“In high school, I always looked up to the collegiate runners,” Koll said. “It was always something I wanted to do, and I always wanted to be there and in my head – I always knew I could achieve it – but to actually be there now, it’s surreal.”

Jenna Caffrey, another Drake Relays veteran from high school, narrowly missed qualifying for the 100-meter hurdle finals. Caffrey finished second in her heat but finished ninth overall in the preliminaries.

The sophomore’s time of 13.93 seconds was her best this season, but she missed qualifying for finals by 0.12 seconds. The time also missed the regional-qualifying mark by 0.01 seconds.

“It gives me confidence knowing that my time is dropping, and if I keep working hard, it will keep dropping,” Caffrey said. “I want to stay focused and put things together that I’ve been working on in practice, and it would be great if my time would keep dropping.”

Although Caffrey came up short this time, she still has not given up on the thought of winning the Relays in future.

“It is definitely one of my dreams and goals,” Caffrey said. “I got some titles in high school and I would like to get some in college. Whether it happens next year, I’m going to work towards that.”

Caffrey, like the members of the Cyclones’ 4-by-100 meter relay team who also missed qualifying for finals, had to battle the cold and some light rain, but Caffrey actually enjoyed the weather.

“This is my kind of weather,” Caffrey said. “I felt like I had the upper hand coming into this. I like this weather. It gave me a little bit of a boost.”

The Drake Relays ended with the 4-by-1,600-meter relay for the Cyclones. The team of Erin Penticoff, Stacey Thiel, Kellien Oettle and Dawn Caffrey placed 13th with a time of 20:54.45.

“I was very excited to run here – I love the fans and I love the adrenaline,” said senior Dawn Caffrey.