JOLIET, Ill. - No new national qualifiers emerged from the Goshen track and field teams at the USF Fighting Chance Invite on Friday and Saturday, despite a close attempt from Jordan Garlinger in the 1,500 meters. The men's 4x800-meter relay team will represent Goshen at the NAIA Outdoor Track & Field Championships at Indiana Wesleyan University on May 21. Should they advance, they will run again the next day.

Mercy Chebet ended her storied career as a Maple Leaf on Friday with a time of 17:58.31 in the 5,000 meters. She was a five-time All-American as a Maple Leaf - twice in the outdoor 5,000, once in the indoor 5,000 and twice in cross country. She was an all-conference selection twice in her senior year in both cross country and outdoor track and field.

On Friday night, Garlinger won his section of the men's 1,500 meters. He led the whole way through, but he especially widened the gap in his final 400 meters. He was ahead of the second-place runner by a second with a lap to go but beat him by more than four seconds when the race was complete. Despite the performance, Garlinger's time of 3:54.95 was just beyond the require NAIA B standard of 3:52.00 for nationals. Mathew Keitany's school record of 3:52.43 was set last year.

Garlinger also led Goshen's group of five men's 800 meter open runners on Saturday. His time of 1:55.68 was the second-best among the 69-member field but was a few seconds shy of the NAIA B standard of 1:52.00. The school record is 1:53.93 set by Lucas Harnish in 2014. Bruno Kipsang wasn't far behind with a fourth-place finish at 1:56.38. Charlie Aldrich came in 17th, Jacob Friesen in 26th and Max Estep in 50th.

Jesse Bontrager placed sixth of 20 in the men's 5,000 meters open section 3 on Friday with a 15:51.49 time. Stephany Claudio was sixth of 15 in her section of the 1,500 meters invitational with a time of 4:58.66. She also ran a 2:25.48 time in the 800 meters the next day. Detroit Walker had a 15.44 time in the prelims of the 110-meter hurdles to qualify for the final but did not finish the finals race after a slight stumble.

In the field events, Liam Shaw had a personal-bets throw of 44.95 meters (147 feet, six inches) in the discus. He had no fouls among his six attempts and came in sixth of 17. Then, in the long jump, Evan O'Toole finished seventh of 17 after jumping a distance of 6.35 meters (20 feet, ten inches) on his third effort. He also had an impressive jump of 20 feet, 5.25 inches on his first attempt.

Bruno Kipsang, Charlie Aldrich, Kevin Liddell and Jordan Garlinger will represent the Leafs at the NAIA national meet. They will run at 6:50 pm on Wednesday, May 21 and then again at 6:30 pm the next day if they qualify.