ELLENSBURG, Wash. – A trio of Western Washington University Track & Field team members helped earn team points for the upcoming conference championships by earning top-8 finishes at the 2021 Great Northwest Athletic Conference Combined Event Championships.
 
The two-day event wrapped up Tuesday with the men's decathlon competing its five final events and the women's heptathlon holding the final three events at the CWU Recreation Sports Complex.
 
In the men's decathlon, sophomore Cooper Cummings had a strong finish to place 5^th with 5,916 points to just miss entering the WWU all-time top-10. Cummings recorded a personal-best mark in the 110m hurdles (16.95) and recorded top-5 finishes in the pole vault (4^th, 4.30m/14-1.25), javelin (4^th (44.12m/144-9) and the 1500m (5^th, 4:49.64).
 
Freshman Ryan Kenny placed 7^th with 5,697 points, which included collegiate-best marks in the javelin (41.85m/137-4) and the 110m hurdles (16.45).
 
In the women's heptathlon sophomore Leanne Kibbee placed 8^th place with a personal-best 3,840 points. A day after setting personal-best marks in the 200m (28.30) and the shot put (8.49m/27-10.25), Kibbee had a strong finish to the championships with a PR in the javelin (27.20m/89-3) and the 800m (2:55.74).
 
The top eight finishers in each the decathlon and heptathlon will earn points (10-8-6-5-4-3-2-1) towards the team score for the GNAC Outdoor Track & Field Championship standings that will be held May 14-15 at McArthur Field in Monmouth, Oregon on the campus of Western Oregon University. Kibbee's performance will earn the Vikings one point in the women's team standings, while Cummings (4 points) and Kenny (2 points) will add six points to the men's team score in two weeks.
 
Braydon Maier of Central Washington became a two-time decathlon winner with 6,776 points and Seattle Pacific's Renick Meyer totaled 4,903 points to win the heptathlon.
  A small contingent of Vikings are scheduled to compete Friday at the  Ken Shannon Invitational hosted by the University of Washington in Seattle. Live results for the meet at Husky Outdoor Track can be followed via WWUVikings.com/TF_Live.