PHILADELPHIA – The Georgia Tech men’s and women’s track and field team enjoyed a record-setting opening day at the Penn Relays on Thursday evening. Taylor Wade set the program record in the 5000m at 13:40.71 alongside four top-five program times.
Wade treaded towards the back of the pack in the opening heat of the 5000m, biding his time through the first 3000m. Just over three minutes later, he was flying past runners and jumped 15 places to eighth place at the 4200m checkpoint.
The junior kept his foot on the gas and came across the line fifth overall at 13:40.71, a brand new personal best and the top time in program history. His time clears Andrew Kent’s time set in 2021 at 13:47.77, over seven seconds faster than the five-year program record. Wade set the third program record of the season, second on the track.
Lottie Chappell came alive in the 1500m race to open the day for the Jackets, clocking in at 4:16.53, 2.5 seconds faster than her personal best. Her time was just 0.19 seconds off the program best, settling into the second fastest women’s 1500m all-time Tech time.
Billy Carlton and Matt Castronuovo made some noise in the 3000m steeplechase as Carlton finished three seconds off the race winner to claim second place at 8:43.32. Castronuovo finished seventh overall and blitzed past his personal best by nearly 10 seconds at 8:48.08, earning his first career top-five program record with the fourth-fastest time.
Carlton’s program-record time of 8:38.49 set at the 2026 Raleigh Relays remains the No. 4 time in the ACC and 25th nationally. Castronuovo enters the conference conversation with the 10th fastest time coming into today’s event.
Alexander Arrambide ran solo in the men’s 1500m and passed by his personal best time at 3:43.07 to claim a top-10 finish, 0.97 seconds faster than his time set at Lee Fast Break Athletics Invitational two weeks ago.
Sophomore Claire Shelton completed her first 5000m race and led a foursome of Tech runners home at 16:21.18 to finish 24th overall. Hannah Schemmel claimed her personal best at 16:35.39 while freshman Wyatt Windham also his personal best at 14:23.78 in the men’s race.
Tech will have its main men’s distance medley relay squad racing on Friday at 12:45 p.m. Arrambide, Caden Terrell, Kamren Kennedy, and John Jessup comprise the relay team before the women’s 4x800m team races on Saturday.
Full Steam Ahead
Full Steam Ahead is a $500 million fundraising initiative to achieve Georgia Tech athletics’ goal of competing for championships at the highest level in the next era of intercollegiate athletics. The initiative will fund transformative projects for Tech athletics, including renovations of Bobby Dodd Stadium at Hyundai Field (the historic home of Georgia Tech football), the Zelnak Basketball Center (the practice and training facility for Tech basketball) and O’Keefe Gymnasium (the venerable home of Yellow Jackets volleyball), as well as additional projects and initiatives to further advance Georgia Tech athletics through program wide-operational support. All members of the Georgia Tech community are invited to visit atfund.org/FullSteamAhead for full details and renderings of the renovation projects, as well as to learn about opportunities to contribute online.
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