STANFORD’S CARTER NAMED BOWERMAN SEMIFINALIST

June 18, 2013



STANFORD’S CARTER NAMED BOWERMAN SEMIFINALIST



Hurdles star among those in contention for track and field’s highest honor





STANFORD, Calif. – Stanford junior Kori Carter, the reigning NCAA women’s 400-meter hurdles champion, was named as a semifinalist for The Bowerman, collegiate track and field’s highest annual honor, by the by U.S. Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association on Tuesday.



Carter was among 10 semifinalists for the award, joining Arizona’s Brigetta Barrett (high jump), Oklahoma’s Tia Brooks (throws), Colorado’s Emma Coburn (distance), Dartmouth’s Abbey D’Agostino (distance), LSU’s Kimberlyn Duncan (sprints), Oregon’s English Gardner (sprints), Clemson’s Brianna Rollins (hurdles), Iowa State’s Betsy Saina (distance), and Illinois’ Ashley Spencer (sprints).



Three women’s finalists will be named Thursday, July 11, and the men’s and women’s winners will be announced at a ceremony in Orlando, Fla., on December 18 after a vote of coaches and media. No Stanford athlete has won the fifth-year trophy, which is named after longtime Oregon coach Bill Bowerman.



Carter’s accomplishments are impressive:



She ran a world-leading time in the 400 hurdles for the third time this year while breaking NCAA meet and collegiate in-season records with a time of 53.21 on June 7 in Eugene, Ore. A day later, Carter was second in the 100 hurdles in 12.79.



Heading into the USATF Championships this week in Des Moines, Iowa, Carter continues to rank No. 1 in the world in the 400 hurdles and is No. 8 in the 100 hurdles, though she will concentrate on the longer event in her quest for a top-three finish and a berth in August’s IAAF World Championships in Moscow, Russia. Carter has world championship ‘A’ standards in both events.



Unique to Carter among the semifinalists is the breadth of her breakthrough season. She had never reached an NCAA final before, but this year ran the 400 hurdles more than 10 seconds faster than she had in her NCAA preliminary heat in 2012.



Carter improved upon her personal and school records by an astonishing 3.49 seconds this season in the 400 hurdles and 0.23 in the 100 hurdles.



Carter is a nine-time All-America and the Stanford record holder in every outdoor and indoor hurdle race. Her NCAA-winning time is No. 2 in collegiate history, and the fastest against collegiate-only competition. It also makes Carter the No. 6 performer in U.S. history in that event.



In her 400 hurdles season debut on April 6, Carter crushed her personal best and school record by 2.39 seconds in beating 2012 Olympic fifth-place finisher Georganne Moline on her home track in Tucson, Ariz. The time of 54.71 marked the first of three world-leading times that Carter would run in 2013 and the first of her five victories over Moline, the NCAA and Pac-12 runner-up, in as many tries.



In fact, the NCAA final marked the first race in collegiate history in which two competitors – Carter and Moline -- broke 54 seconds.



Carter was a two-time champion at the Pac-12 Championships, capturing both hurdles races, including a repeat in the 100 hurdles. Her time of 12.76 in the 100 hurdles was a personal best by 0.23 and yet another Stanford record.



Over her collegiate career, Carter combined to break school hurdle records 11 times – four each in the outdoor 400 and 100, and three in the indoor 60.



Already, Carter has been named women’s track athlete of the year for the Pac-12 – the first from Stanford to receive that honor since sprinter Chryste Gaines in 1992 – and the West Region.



Other highlights for Carter in 2013: a Mountain Pacific Sports Federation indoor title in the 200, a 50.9 4x400 anchor split at the NCAA West Prelims, and a second-team All-America honor in the 60 hurdles.





For more information, contact:



David Kiefer

Assistant Athletic Communications Director

Stanford University

dkiefer@stanford.edu

(650) 736-7921