GRAND JUNCTION, Colo.  Western Colorado celebrated a trio of first-place individual finishes Sunday afternoon on the final day of the 2024 Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Outdoor Track & Field Championship Meet as the Mountaineer men finished the three-day meet in fourth place while the women placed fifth in the final team standings. 

Ali Aldrich, Kaiya Firor and Simon Kelati represented Western on the top step of the podium with Firor adding a facility record to her victory and Kelati setting an RMAC championship meet record with his win at the Colorado Mesa University Track & Field Complex. 

Aldrich was the first champion of the day, capturing the women's shot put with a best throw of 15.68 meters (51 feet-5.25 inches). Her second toss on the day would have been good enough for third place but she followed that attempt with her winning throw one toss later. 

Kelati stepped on the oval in the first individual event of the day for the men and fought off a challenge from the runner-up to win the 1,500-meter run with a time of 3 minutes, 48.15 seconds. Teammate Tyler Nord was not far behind, finishing in third place with a time of 3:49.66. Kelati's time broke the championship meet record, and his altitude-converted time (3:48.67) surpassed the NCAA provisional mark and at the close of the day sits seventh on the Division II national performance list. 

Setting a pair of records with her win in the women's 400-meter hurdles was Firor, who broke the facility record with her winning time of 58.90 seconds while also setting a new Western Colorado record. Bettering her previous provisional time, Firor's altitude-adjusted time of 59.01 is second in the country after the weekend. 

Four other Mountaineers surpassed or bettered their previous provisional marks on Sunday. 

In the women's 1,500 it was Leah Taylor's sixth-place time of 4:27.43 that moves her up to 11th nationally with an altitude-adjusted time of 4:21.47. Emma Kjellsen finished ninth in a time of 4:35.82, but her altitude-adjusted time of 4:23.16 betters the NCAA provisional standard and is listed at 15th nationally as of Sunday night. 

Landon Gary added the next provisional with his third-place finish in the men's 400m dash. His raw time of 47.49 translates to 47.60, 36th nationally. 

Allison Beasley, Saturday's RMAC steeplechase champion and new RMAC meet record holder in the event, surpassed the NCAA provisional time in the women's 5,000, placing second with a time of 16:47.04. Her altitude-adjusted clocking of 16:23.16 ranks 15th in the nation. 

Western athletes populated most of the events in Sunday's day of finals. Scoring points for the Mountaineers included results from: 

Western scored points in both women's relays Sunday and in one of the men's relay events. 

The quartet of Jada Hynds, Harrison, Cora Olson and Dantzler teamed up for a fourth-place finish in the 4x100 relay, setting a new Mountaineer record with a time of 46.01 seconds. 

In the women's 4x400 it was Lauren Willson, Kiarra Lapp, Reece Mercer and Peyton Weiss combining for eighth place with a time of 3:58.22. 

The men's 4x400 of Prost, Bryce Kizewski, Jeremy Killoy and Gary combined for a fourth-place time of 3:17.97. 

Western's men accumulated 87.5 points to finish fourth overall, with the University of Colorado Colorado Springs winning the men's title with 178 points. 

The Mountaineer women were fifth in the team standings with 85 points, behind women's team champion Colorado School of Mines with 144 points. 

Qualifiers for the NCAA D-II national championship meet on May 23-25 in Emporia, Kansas, will be announced on Tuesday, May 14.