The William and Mary women's track and field team opened the Colonial Relays Friday with several outstanding performances including a freshman record at 5,000m and a stadium and meet-record in the pole vault.  Villanova leads the team race with 70 points, with Georgetown second at 35 and Bucknell third with 34 points.

5,000m Run
In the 5,000m, Kathleen Lautzenheiser (Midlothian, Va.) continued her stunning 2011 campaign by shattering the Tribe's freshman record and taking seventh place overall in 16:43.58.  She was more than 16 seconds faster than Laurie Sturgell's 16:59.96 in May of 1997 that had been the standard for freshmen, and also qualified for both the ECAC and USAT&F Junior Championships.

Pole Vault
In the pole vault, senior Emily Jeremiah (Mechanicsville, Va.) and freshman Nicole Dory (Fort Worth, Texas) tied for fifth place in the championship section after clearing the bar at 3.40 meters (11-1.75).  The event was won by volunteer assistant coach Janice Keppler , who broke the meet and stadium records with her vault of 4.10m (13-5.25).

More Records
The day also saw records fall in two more events besides the pole vault.  In the 3,000m steeplechase, Villanova's Alison Smith shaved nearly 10 seconds off of the time she ran last year to win in 10:24.52, and set both the stadium and meet records in the process.  In the 10,000m, Beth Kelly of Richmond completed her 25 laps in 36:19.18 to surpass the meet record of Angeli Sivaraman (37:11.49) set last year by nearly a minute.  Kelly's time was also more than 30 seconds ahead of the old stadium record of 36:51.23 set by W&M's Emily Gousen '08 at the 2008 CAA Championships.

The Colonial Relays continue tomorrow with the finals of all seven relays and the remaining field events, in addition to the finals of the 100m dash, 100m hurdles, and 3,000m run.