VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. – The Colorado State University Pueblo men's and women's track and field teams opened up competition here Friday on the first day of the 2023 NCAA Division II Indoor Track and Field National Championships at the Virginia Beach Sports Center.

On the first day of action, the Pack competed in three events as sophomore Helen Braybrook (Frieston, England/Oakham School) competed in the preliminaries of the women's 800 meter run, while sophomore Reece Sharman-Newell (Hampshire, England) ran in the preliminaries of the men's 800 meter run and then the men's Distance Medley Relay team also competed for a national title.

The ThunderWolves' men are tied for 13th after the first day of the indoor national championships with five points after four events, while the Pack women did not score any points through six events on Friday's first day of action. On the men's side, Missouri Southern leads the way with 16 points, while Adams State, Wingate, Pittsburg State and Colorado School of Mines is tied for second place with 10 points. Meanwhile, on the women's side, Adams State and Colorado School of Mines is tied for first with 20 points, while West Texas A&M is third with 16 points and Grand Valley State is third with 15 points.

Braybrook recorded the fastest qualifying time in the 800 meters as she ran a personal best time of 2:07.79 to earn the top qualifying time into Saturday's championship final, which is scheduled for 3:10 p.m. MT. Braybrook's time was nearly a second faster than the No. 2 qualifying time of 2:08.30, which was run by Colorado School of Mines' Aryelle Wright.

Meanwhile, Sharman-Newell ran the second fastest qualifying time in the men's 800 meters with a time of 1:51.41 to qualify for Saturday's championship final, which is scheduled for 3:20 p.m. MT. Sharman-Newell's time was a little more than 30-hundredths of a second behind Angelo State's Oussama El Bouchayby, who ran the fastest qualifying time of 1:51.04.

In the men's Distance Medley Relay, the Pack's team, which entered the indoor championships seeded No. 2 nationally, recorded a fourth-place finish to give the CSU Pueblo its five points. The Pac, who were leading heading into the final leg of the race recorded a time of 9:45.23 to fall from the lead to fourth after Sharman-Newell crossed the finish line as the Pack's anchor leg. The members of the fourth place DMR team are Sharman-Newell, junior Matisse Virey (Lyon, France), junior Tyrell Smith (Colorado Springs, Colo./Mesa Ridge) and junior Kaleb Tipton (Lawton, Okla./Lawton). With their fourth place finish, Virey, Smith, Tipton and Sharman-Newell earned First-Team All-American honors.

Wingate took home the gold medal in the event with a Virginia Beach Sports Center fieldhouse record time of 9:42.81, while Northwest Missouri State earned the silver medal with a time of 9:43.12 and Missouri Southern captured the bronze medal with a time of 9:44.75.

In Saturday's final day of action, the Pack will have four competitors competing in the shot put as sophomore Katherine Higgins (Mead, Colo./Ponderosa) and freshman Febe Wessels (Pretoria, South Africa) will compete for the women, while the men's shot put will feature senior Nate Miller (Colorado Springs, Colo./Widefield) and junior Justin Jenks (Helena, Mont./Helena Capital). The women's shot put competition begins at 12:45 p.m. MT on Saturday, March 11, while the men's shot action begins at 2:45 p.m. MT on Saturday, March 11.

In addition to the four shot putters competing for an individual national title, Braybrook and Sharman-Newell will run in the finals of the 800-meter run.

CSU Pueblo has earned indoor track national titles in three different events as the men team has won national titles in the 800 meters in 2018 (Thomas Staines) and 2019 (Thomas Staines) and captured the national title in the DMR (Patrick Scroggins, Shawn Horne, Devundrick Walker, Thomas Staines) in 2019, while the women's team owns two national titles – the long jump (Lauren Fairchild) in 2019 and the DMR (Hailey Streff, Taylor Holland, Helen Braybrook, Yasmine Hernandez) last season.

Here is a complete schedule of events for CSU Pueblo's competitors on Saturday's second day of the 2023 NCAA Division II Indoor Track and Field National Championships.

Katherine Higgins, shot put, 12:45 p.m. MT (No. 4 seed)
Febe Wessels, shot put, 12:45 p.m. MT (No. 14 seed)
Nate Miller, shot put, 2:45 p.m. MT (No. 2 seed)
Justin Jenks, shot put, 2:45 p.m. MT (No. 4 seed)
Helen Braybrook, 800 meters final, 3:10 p.m. MT (No. 1 qualifying time)
Reece Sharman-Newell, 800 meters final, 3:20 p.m. MT (No. 2 qualifying time)