The Bethune-Cookman women’s 4x100 meter relay team finished fourth in their heat (13th overall) on Wednesday evening as they competed in the preliminary round of the NCAA Outdoor Championships in Des Moines, Iowa.

“I am very proud of the way the girls ran, but it just wasn’t our day today,” expressed second-year head coach Garfield Ellenwood. “We see what we have to do to get better, and we will certainly work on that next year. But I am happy at a great starting point for us.”

The team, comprised of Tavia Burke, Rockel Mitchell, Christina Roundtree and Dianne Munroe, were all newcomers to the Wildcats program this year under Ellenwood and his staff. They ran a time of 44.78 seconds in their preliminary round which was good enough for fourth place in the heat. That was the 13th best time overall for the first round?not good enough for them to advance to the semifinals. They ran alongside Texas A&M (43.19q), Texas-El Paso (44.10q), Ole Miss (44.66) and Kansas State (45.14). Texas A&M took the overall winning time for the heat while also holding the overall bets time.

The event, hosted by Drake University at Drake Stadium, continues through Saturday.

Bethune-Cookman has both the 4x100 women’s squad and star freshman Ronnie Ash competing in this year’s national championships. This is the first time in recent years B-CU has had anyone compete at all.

“I really think Ronnie can compete in this year’s competition,” admits Ellenwood. “This is a great field of athletes competing here, but Ronnie has trained very hard, and I think he’s ready to go on Thursday.”