Saints’ Durden finishes 6th in decathlon at GNAC championships
Saint Martin’s University junior David Durden won the men’s javelin at the Great Northwest Athletic Conference Combined Event Championships on Tuesday at SMU.
Durden finished sixth in the decathlon, scoring three points for SMU heading into the GNAC championships on May 13-14 in Eugene, Oregon.
In the final five events on Tuesday, Durden won the javelin with his toss of 165 feet, 2 inches. He took fourth in the pole vault (12- 1/2), and sixth in the 110-meter hurdles (22.1 seconds), discus (90-1 1/2) and 1,500 (5:47.38). He finished with 4,753 points.
“If David could have run on his arms he might have won the entire decathlon because he beat the field in the javelin by nearly 6 meters,” SMU assistant coach Kyle Stevenson said. “It was great to see David in great spirits throughout the day and finish the competition.”
Alaska Anchorage’s Cody Thomas won the decathlon with 7,201 points.
On the first day of competition, Durden finished tied for third in the high jump (5-11 1/4), fourth in the 100 (11.56) and sixth in the shot put (32-8 1/2), long jump (19-7) and 400 (1:05.06).
“I struggled to survive, but I had some highlight moments during the meet,” Durden said.
This story was originally published May 3, 2016 at 9:00 PM with the headline "Saints’ Durden finishes 6th in decathlon at GNAC championships."