The Cyclone women’s track team stole the show at the Mercantile Meet held at the UNI-Dome last Friday night.

Iowa State collected seven first place finishes during the evening, rounding up 72.5 points to win the intrastate meet. Iowa’s total was 45.5, while Northern Iowa and Drake tallied 28 and 18 respectively.

All-American Kris Curnyn tossed for first in the shot put and the weight throw, leading ISU to a gold finish.

Curnyn won the shot with a fling of 47-6 1/2. She heaved the weight 59-1 1/2. Also on the field, high-jumper Leah Elbert jumped 5-8 to soar above the intrastate competition. Sydney Pounds, Amber Garrett, Alienor Gilchrist and Erin Bresnan also garnered first place finishes.

Pounds took the 3,000-meter with a time of 10:14.35. ISU’s Gayle Nugent recovered from a fall at the race’s start that put her considerably far back in the field to finish second.

“I didn’t want that to wreck my race,” she said. “I didn’t want that to be an excuse for a poor performance.”

She finished 16 seconds behind Pounds and said she was happy with her individual performance as well as the team’s.

“I thought it was fun to see us so far ahead. The distance runners did really well.”

Garrett grabbed the top spot in the 1,000-meter, clocking 2:59.38. ISU’s Stacey Armstrong, Gilchrist and Laurie Meythaler took second, third and fourth respectively. Gilchrist won the mile in 5:04.33 and was chased in by Meythaler, who took the silver.

Bresnan said she and her Cyclone teammate, Joanne Roepke, dominated the 600-yard dash.

She said, “I was pleased with my race. Joanne and I pushed each other to personal records.

“We take pride in winning an intrastate meet by such a wide margin. It gives us confidence for the bigger meets,” Bresnan added.

The ISU Classic will again challenge the Cyclone leggers to push ahead for better times. The weekend meet will be held Friday and Saturday.