April 20, 2018
Virginia Challenge Photo Gallery 
By Matt Paras
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. – The Notre Dame distances runners kicked off the first day of the Virginia Challenge Friday night. Jessica Harris’ runner-up finish in the 800m run was the highlight of the first day of action for the Irish.
Harris led a trio of women in the 800m invite. Running in the first section with teammate Kelly Hart, Harris finished with a time of 2:06.46 while Hart was not far behind with a 2:07.79. After the five sections were completed, Harris’ time was good enough to finish second overall out of 36 runners. Hart finished eighth overall while Samantha Murray finished 16th with a 2:09.78. Harris recorded a season-best time and finish in the 800m.
On the men’s side in the 800m, senior Kirk Hansen led the way for the Irish. Hansen finished 27th overall with a 1:53.03. Elijah Silva finished 33rd with a 1:53.44 and Clayton Goldman was right behind him, finishing 34th with a 1:53.50. Goldman finished with a season-best time, improving from the 1:53.69 he ran at the Stanford Invitational.
Junior Anthony Williams competed in the first event of the night for the Irish. Running in the second section of the 3000m steeplechase, Williams finished 18th overall with a personal record 9:08.40. The Bloomington, Ind. native shaved over 20 seconds off his time from last weekend when he ran a 9:33.29 at the Louisville Invitational.
Kaitlin Frei and Claudia Magnussen closed out the first day of action for the Irish. The final event of the day happened to be the longest event of the meet, the 10000m run, which requires 25 laps around the track. Frei led the way with a personal record 35:29.87 and finished 12th. Magnussen wasnt far behind, finishing 15th with a 35:39.68 in her first collegiate attempt at the race.
Up Next
The distance squad will be back in action tomorrow in Charlottesville for the second day of the Virginia Challenge. Parker Jones will kick things off for the Irish in the 1500m run, which is scheduled to begin at 10:50 a.m.
The rest of the team will start things off at the Michael Johnson Invitational down in Waco. First events are at 10 a.m. ET with the men’s hammer and women’s javelin. Gabrielle Diederich will represent the Irish in the javelin while the trio of Logan Kusky, John Stefan and Shae Watkins will throw in the hammer.
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Matt Paras, athletics communications assistant director at the University of Notre Dame, has been part of the Fighting Irish athletics communications team since January 2018. In his role, he coordinates all media efforts for the Notre Dame women’s lacrosse and cross country/track & field programs. A native of Warwick, Rhode Island, Paras is a graduate of the University of Louisville where he completed his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Sport Administration. Prior to arriving at Notre Dame, he worked at Vanderbilt University as the sports information contact for the women’s soccer and lacrosse programs.