RALEIGH, N.C. -- On Thursday the Yale men's track and field team kicked off Day 1 of the Raleigh Relays Invitational. The men's squad competed in only three events; the men's shot put was held under the peak of the hot Carolina sun, and then as the day cooled, the distance events began with the 1500m at 4.30 p.m. and then the 5000m running as late as 9:00 p.m. 
 
In the 1500m Yale had six athletes competing. The duo of Winslow Atkeson and Liam Garrett, both mile finalists at the IC4A championships earlier this month, were again the standout performers. Both athletes ran within a second of each other, with Atekson running a new personal best time of 3:48.00 and Garrett also clocking a new PB of 3:48.74. Calvin Katz was the third-place performer for the Yale team also running impressively in a time of 3:52.19, also a personal best for him. With these sorts of improvements already showing at the first 1500m of the season, these athletes will feel confident of even stronger times come conference competition. 
 
The 5000m event was an equally hotly contested battle, with a several pros and internationals also competing. Stephen Moody and Leo Brewer did well to come 56^th and 57^th overall in the competition as they both finished within merely a 10th of a second apart. Moody ran a time of 14:16.24 and Brewer ran a PR of 14:16.32. Sophomore Varun Oberai was in hot pursuit as he ran a new PR of 14:21.64. 
 
In the field, Yale had three athletes competing in the shot put. Matt Appel was Yale's best performer on the day as he placed fourth with a distance of 17.87m. Chris Ward placed 11th overall in the meet with a distance of 16.57m and first year Nolan Recker threw 14.91m. These are all impressive marks to kick off the season and given the success of the throwing core throughout the indoor season, we can expect large improvements over the next weeks.
 
Many more of the Yale team will be in action tomorrow, including Heps scorers Brian Di Bassinga in the triple jump and Appel returning for the discus competition. On the track Yale has team captain Harry Grindle entered in the 400m, and then starting at 9.25 p.m. the 10k will include Cade Brown and Sean Kay, both athletes capable of record-altering performances over this distance.
 
Full results for Thursday's competition as well as live results for Friday can be found here. A video stream of Friday night's competition is available on ACCNX.