Feb. 29, 2008

HOUSTON ----- UAB senior Elizabeth Ambrus won her third Conference USA indoor 5,000-meter title here Friday to highlight the Blazers' performances at the league's indoor track and field championships.

Ambrus won the event with a school and meet record time of 16:31.83, beating her closest competition by more than 30 seconds. Her time was a C-USA Indoor meet record for the 5,000, breaking the six-year-old mark of 16:33.24 set by South Florida's Tara Quinn in 2002. Her effort also bested the Yeoman Fieldhouse record and was well under the NCAA provisional-qualifying time of 15:46.60.

Ambrus has now qualified for NCAAs six times during her career at UAB.

The Blazers' distance medley relay placed third behind Tulsa and Rice. UAB ran a 11:54.61, slow for this season, which helped them move into fifth place overall at the conclusion of the first day of events.

Katryce Sykes placed sixth and Timara McMillan eighth in the pentathlon.

Overall UAB has scored 21 points, with most of them belonging to Ambrus. Rice currently leads the teams standing with 43 points. UTEP is in second (39), Memphis in the third slot (32) and Tulsa behind them in fourth (22).

Many of the events that UAB participated in Friday did not hold finals. However the Blazers did set themselves up for an exciting final day that could shake up the current team standings.

The Blazers also got outstanding performances from middle distance runners Alina Varpiotaite and Genoah Collins as each won their 800-meter qualfying heat to advance to Saturday's final. Varpiotaite ran the second-fastest qualifying time (2:10.74) while Collins was clocked with the third-best time (2:10.79).

UAB's Tara Colvin won her heat in the 400-meter dash with a time of 56.36 to advance to Saturday's final.

Erika Russ unexpectedly did not qualify for the finals of the 60-meter hurdles. Coming into the meet, Russ had the league's third fastest mark of 8.69 seconds. She posted a 9.06 and finished only in the top 15.

The final day of the C-USA Indoor Championship sets off with the conclusion the men's heptathlon at 9 a.m. Field events start 11 a.m. with the running events kicking off beginning at 1 p.m.

To follow the final results of the 2008 C-USA Indoor Championship visit the championship central page by clicking here.