Despite falling under the umbrella of the same sport, indoor and outdoor track and field are inherently different when it comes to team composition at the collegiate level. With 21 events contested in the outdoor postseason as opposed to 17 indoors, it doesn’t just afford a larger volume of scoring opportunities, but a wider variety of where those opportunities are concentrated.
For a Florida program that finished third in the men’s race and tied for fifth in the women’s at the NCAA Indoor Championships, the outdoor season brings new faces into the fold who don’t have an equivalent event indoors, as well as changing distances that could be more suited to athletes’ strengths.
The most obvious event group that will see a benefit from the change of seasons is the men’s throws. Freshman Jarno van Daalen and graduate student John Luke Witte both scored points at the conference meet for the Gators, with van Daalen carrying his success into a seventh-place finish at the national meet. The pair made up a formidable tandem in the shot put and weight throw, respectively, and the additions of junior Leikel Cabrera Gay and freshman Basel Abosina will only add to that.
Cabrera Gay finished as the national runner-up in the javelin during his first season as a Gator, throwing a personal best of 79.05 meters in June at the NCAA Outdoor Championships. The 21-year-old represented his native Cuba on the international stage during the summer, also finishing second at the Pan American Junior Games in Paraguay. With another offseason under the tutelage of UF throws coach Eric Werskey done and dusted, Cabrera Gay could be entering this spring with not just a national title as his target, but also the 36-year-old school record of 83.30 meters, held by six-time U.S. champion Tom Pukstys.
Abosina is a winter signee from Egypt, and the 22-year-old is a talented hammer thrower. He threw a personal best of 70.67 meters in April to claim bronze at the Egyptian Championships. That mark would already place him fifth in UF history, and would have ranked second in the SEC last spring and 11th in the NCAA. If he can transition smoothly to collegiate competition, Abosina will make an immediate impact.
It’s also worth noting that while van Daalen will continue to display his shot put prowess during the outdoor season, he’ll also add the discus to his arsenal. The Dutchman took home silver at the 2024 World Junior Championships, and his personal best of 57.79 meters would have ranked just outside of the top 10 throwers in the conference last year.
The distance events get a near-complete overhaul during track’s second season: the mile becomes 1,500 meters, the long distance offerings transition from 3,000 and 5,000 meters to 5,000 and 10,000, and the steeplechase is introduced. For Florida’s most notable distance athletes on the men’s and women’s sides – freshman Kelvin Cheruiyot and senior Hilda Olemomoi – the added mileage is more than welcome.
Cheruiyot broke program records in both distance races indoors, collecting a pair of SEC bronze medals as well. Despite the success he found during his first track season in Gainesville, Florida distance coach Will Palmer has highlighted that the Kenyan’s best event will be the 25-lapper outdoors.
Olemomoi has a proven track record of success at basically every distance she’s attempted, but the 10,000 meters may be her strongest race. She finished fifth at the national championships in 2023 before improving to a runner-up position in 2024, behind only Florida legend Parker Valby. Her first outdoor season as a Gator was riddled with injuries, but she still managed to place second at the SEC Championships and qualify for the national meet over 10K, before being forced to withdraw from the final race of the season. Olemomoi has been both consistent and healthy during her final year in the NCAA, and that’s a trend that should benefit her as she returns to her bread-and-butter event.
A final distance note that is slightly more under the radar is Graham Myers’ return to the steeplechase. The sophomore from Fleming Island, Florida, had a rough debut in the event in April, but closed his freshman campaign out with a win at the East Coast Relays and a 10th-place finish at the SEC Championships. Racing unattached during the indoor season, Myers ran a personal best of 8:07.50 over 3,000 meters, which could bode well for his prospects over the barriers.
Speaking of barriers, the number of hurdles races doubles during the outdoor season, with the 400-meter variant coming into play. Sophomore Vance Nilsson didn’t get to fully showcase his potential last spring, only racing twice, but the Arizona native is one of the best long hurdles prospects the U.S. has ever seen. In 2024, he made it to the semifinals of the Olympic Trials before going on to win the World Junior title. He also owns the high school record in the 300-meter hurdles. Nilsson only raced twice this indoor season as opposed to 12 times last year, so he’s more of an unknown commodity entering his second outdoor season, but a return to his high school form could prove to be significant for the Gators.
Freshman Sydney Sutton was one of the brightest stars for Florida during the indoor season, as she excelled over 200 and 400 meters, but the Maryland native is also an ace over the 400-meter hurdles. She ran 56.04 to narrowly finish as runner-up at New Balance Nationals Outdoor in June, becoming the ninth-fastest hurdler in high school history in the process. It remains to be seen whether or not Sutton will still contest this race collegiately or focus on her potential in the flat events, but she certainly has the tools to make an impact in the hurdles if she so chooses.
Dropping down in distance, sophomore Habiba Harris is set to return to the track where she’ll look to defend her SEC title in the 100-meter hurdles. For the second season in a row, the 20-year-old Jamaican did not race indoors despite being on the startlist for the Tyson Invitational in February. If she can quickly return to the form that saw her earn the mantle of “fastest hurdler in the nation” as a freshman, Harris is sure to be a valuable injection of talent to a team that already was good enough to win the SEC Indoor title.
Harris was also a prominent fixture on the Gators’ 4x100-meter relay a year ago, and swapping that relay in for the distance medley relay could provide another scoring opportunity. It’s a bit of a wash on the women’s side, as the DMR team finished runner-up at SEC Indoors and fourth at the national meet, which will be difficult to improve upon, but it should be especially beneficial for the men.
The Gator men have won 10 SEC and seven national titles in the quarter-mile relay, but last year was a relative down year, as their quartet finished eighth at the SEC Championships and 21st on the national stage. A healthy Wayna McCoy is guaranteed to be a welcome addition to the lineup, as the Bahamian graduate student ran a strong second leg for a Florida team that finished third at conference and fourth at nationals in 2024.
Freshman Ja’Neil Harris could also slot into the relay this season, as well as make a name for himself in the individual events. The North Carolina native was one of the most versatile sprinters in the country last season, finishing runner-up at 100 and 200 meters at New Balance Nationals Outdoor, as well as posting an impressive time of 46.88 seconds for 400 meters at Florida Relays. Harris didn’t race during the indoor season, but he’s already slated to make his collegiate debut over 400 meters in the Gators’ season opener.
The first opportunity for Florida to experience the difference the outdoor season makes will be in Tallahassee at FSU Relays from Mar. 26-27, before hosting a pair of home meets in April.
Contact Paul Hof-Mahoney at phof-mahoney@alligator.org and follow him on X at @phofmahoney.
Paul is a senior in his fourth semester on the track and field/cross country beat for The Alligator. In his free time, you can increasingly see him jogging around Gainesville or endlessly falling deeper down the rabbit hole that is track Twitter.
