Complete Friday results
STANFORD, Calif. -- The first time was a fast time -- not to mention a world-caliber time -- for Jessica Pixler.
The Seattle Pacific senior, running her initial outdoor 5,000 meters as a Falcon, left the competition behind, and left the record book even farther behind on Friday night at the Stanford Track & Field Invitational.
Pixler shattered the school and the Great Northwest Athletic Conference standards for the 5K with a time of 15 minutes, 44.07 seconds -- which ranks fifth in the world so far this outdoor season -- to win the race handily at Cobb Track on the Stanford campus.
“I felt really good and really relaxed the whole time,” Pixler said. “I felt tactically, I ran a smart race, so I'm very satisfied with how it went. That's the time I've been training for. It went exactly how I wanted it to go.”
Pixler's performance completely obliterated the old SPU and GNAC records. Debbie Quatier had the previous best outdoor time for the Falcons at 16:16.12 in 1978. The conference mark of 16:50.87 was set just last year by Sarah Porter of Western Washington.
Her time also easily beat what stands as the current NCAA Division II record of 15:59.34, set by Julie Bowers of West Chester (Pa.) in 1985. That record was set in the NCAA meet.
The world's top outdoor 5K time so far this season is 15:27.75 set by Mary Teresa Cullen of Ireland. The next three best times belong to Australian runners, with Nicole Chapple immediately above Pixler in fourth place at 15:38.87.
Pixler, however, was keeping that particular aspect of it in perspective.
“It's really early in the season, so that's not going to hold,” Pixler said. “But for now, I can say it's the fifth-best in the world.”
Pixler (Sammamish, Wash./Eastlake HS) beat runner-up Jackie Areson of Tennessee by more than seven seconds (15:51.56).
“We entered her at a 15:45. But we definitely didn't think she would do it by herself -- we thought she would be behind some of these big names,” SPU head track coach Karl Lerum said. “But typical Jessica -- she went out and ran her own race and did it herself.”
Also typical Pixler: She was focused more on her own effort than on who was behind her.
“I kind of had an idea in mind that I had broken the field,” she said. “But I knew there were some real good runners in the field who could come up at any time.”
While this was Pixler's first outdoor 5K, she had run -- and won -- at that distance indoors. She captured the NCAA indoor crown in 2009, and earlier that same season had gone 16:12.65.
Assistant track coach and head cross country coach Erika Daligcon had no doubts Pixler would get below the 16-minute mark on Friday.
“I actually had her paced out at 15:50,” she said. “She had run a 16:12, and we thought we would be on the conservative side and just see what she could do.
“And the thought she could have run faster,” Daligcon added. “She didn't feel as if she had gone to the well.”
Among those Pixler beat on Friday was North Carolina's Brie Felnagle. While both were in high school -- Pixler at Eastlake, Felnagle a year ahead of her at Tacoma's Bellarmine Prep -- Felnagle won three state titles in races that also included Pixler: the 1,600 in 2004 and 2005, and the 3,200 in '05 when Felnagle was a senior and Pixler a junior.
“She's a good runner, so it's always nice to win against someone I respect,” Pixler said.
OTHER FALCONS FLYING, TOO
While Pixler's time made her an automatic qualifier for this year's NCAAs, which are set for the last week of May in Charlotte, N.C., she wasn't the only Falcon to make the national cut on Friday.
Senior teammate Jane Larson (Fall City, Wash./Cedar Park Christian HS) set a personal best and an automatic qualifying time of 4:23.06 to take 11th in the 1,500 meters.
“That's exactly what I wanted to go,” said Larson, who won her individual heat by nearly two full seconds and easily beat her previous PR of 4:26.91, which she set in 2008. “I knew I was going to have to go out there and do the work on my own. I knew I was ready to get into the low 4:20s.”
In addition, three Falcons earned NCAA provisional times: senior Kate Harline (Orem, Utah) in the 1,500(4:36.17), sophomore Natty Plunkett (Bellevue, Wash./Newport HS) in the 5,000 (17:27.11), and sophomore Brittany Aanstad (Lake Stevens, Wash./Lake Stevens HS) in the javelin (140-7).
The meet concludes on Saturday.
