Area roundup: LBSU's Marlow finishes 24th in hammer throw at NCAA Championships

Long Beach State junior Robert Marlow opened the NCAA Outdoor Track & Field Championships on Wednesday afteoon in Eugene, Oregon with a 24th-place finish in the men’s hammer throw.

He started with a toss of 197 feet, 6 inches, his best of the day, before fouling on his next two attempts and finishing 12th in Flight 1.

The top nine finishers at the end of two flights advanced to the final for three more throws, with Oklahoma State senior Nick Miller securing the national title at 242-8.

Marlow, a walk-on at LBSU, eaed All-Big West honors and placed 10th out of 48 in the hammer at the NCAA West Preliminary. He also threw for more than 200 feet in eight meets and had a top-10 showing in every regular-season competition, including an individual victory at the USC Trojan Invitational with a lifetime-best 215-2, good for third in program history.

LBSU has two more athletes set to compete at the University of Oregon’s Hayward Field in senior Fatima Vergara (women’s hammer throw, 2 p.m. today) and junior Riley Cooks (heptathlon, Friday and Saturday).

Both events will be broadcast live on ESPN3.

Sailing

Jack Reiter (San Diego Yacht Club) won his second consecutive Long Beach Yacht Club Junior Match Race Invitational over the weekend, sailing in LBYC’s fleet of Collegiate FJs.

Eight Southe Califoia skippers between the ages of 10 and 18 were invited to compete, with seven participating in the single round-robin match racing format inside Long Beach’s Alamitos Bay Marina.

“We definitely tried to go as fast as we could and tried to have better tactics,” Reiter said. “Our tactics changed from the begiing of the day. We knew which boats we had to beat and worked closely together when we tacked and when we rolled, knowing we had to get more comfortable.”