Yardling Trackmen Finish Best of Freshmen Teams

The freshman track team was the most successful of the spring Yardling teams, compiling an outdoor record of 5-0 and winning the Greater Boston championship.

Coach Ed Stowell's powerhouse boasted superstars and a great deal of depth. Four of the squad are going to England to represent Harvard and Yale against the Cambridge-Oxford team in the biennial international meet.

Leading that quartet is captain Keith Colburn, middle distance and distance runner par excellence. Colburn will run the 880 in the English meet. In an exhibition race during the varsity's meet with Army, he turned in a staggering time of 1:49.3, which would have broken all existing Harvard University and stadium records if it had been run in an official race.

Mile Record

Colburn does boast the official freshman record of 1:52.2 in the 880, and has 4:11.4 in the mile and 49.1 in the 440.

Roy Shaw holds the Yardling mile record of 4:07.4, and will go to England as H-Y's number one miler on that basis.

Bob Galliers' 22 ft. 8 3/4 in. long jump put him on the Harvard-Yale team. He was consistently over 22 ft. all season, and he had a best triple jump of 44 ft, 8 1/2 in.

Frank Champi qualified for the English trip with a 199 foot throw in the javelin. He was defeated only once during the season, losing to Princeton's Sweeney on the basis of a second throw.

Though these four copped the headlines, Yardling tracksters were strong in almost every event, and will doubtlessly provide many varsity performers during the next few years.

The team is particularly strong in jumping. Galliers, Skip Hare, and John Avault swept nearly every meet in both the long and triple jumps. Jim Coleman (6 ft. 3 in.) and Bill McBride (6 ft.) were consistent point getters in the high jump, and between them won in all but one meet. Paul Frankel scored well in the pole vault.

Josh Tolkoff, along with Champi, is the freshmen's best prospect. By the end of the season he was scoring high in the hammer, shot, and discus.

John Metzger and McBride cleaned up in the hurdles. They were undefeated in the highs and lost only once in the intermediates. This loss came to Yale's Lou Roney, who will travel to England.

Yardlings were weaker in the sprints. But Ray Hornblower, Bob Lyng, and Jon Polansky were able to score enough seconds and thirds to keep the opposition honest. The sprint relay team of Metzger, Lyng, Avault, and Hornblower ran only one really good race, but it was when it counted: against Yale.

Shaw and Colburn were unbeatable in the mile. In five dual meets the opponents scored only one third place, as John Heyburn and Gerry Brock provided depth. Erik Roth, Shaw, Brock, and Heyburn were nearly equally as powerful in the two mile. Highlight of the season was Denny Aylward's gutty two mile victory in the Andover meet.

The only remotely close meet of the spring season was the Princeton encounter, but that was won by 14 points, as compared to Harvard's one-half point victory in the winter. The Yale meet was an 109-44 romp; Brown fell 102-51, Dartmouth came out on the short end of a 94-59 score, and Andover succumbed 99-46.

The GBC meet was the year's biggest laugher, as the Yardling's scored 119 points. M.I.T. was the closest competitor with 44 -- 75 points behind.