With the finale of the season fast approaching, NYU’s track and field teams are training hard for the start of the UAA Indoor Championships. Slated to kick off on Saturday, the tough conference marks their third major competition of the spring, and the last before the NCAA Division III championships.

Following a strong start to the season, the teams are striving for similar achievements in conference play, dispersed around the city in vigorous preparation: Throwers and jumpers train at The Armory in Washington Heights, while runners fine-tune strategy and speed in Central Park. According to head coach Tyler Deck Shipley, the UAAs are a “great opportunity” for the Violets to bond and gauge competition ahead of the national championship — for which they each need to finish in the top 22 of their events to qualify.

“We’ve been really encouraged by the start of the indoor track season,” Shipley told WSN. “There’s been a lot of good performances that have set us up. On the national stage, when we go to the meet, it’s exciting to travel together and compete as one team.” 

With multiple record-breaking indoor programs, including sophomore Gianna Dawson’s 2:13.09 800m run, sophomore Rina Kurihara’s 2:55.21 1000m run and first-year Alexa McMillan’s 5.46m long jump, the women’s track and field team has hit the ground running in 2026, recently ranking fourth in the USTFCCCA indoor track and field national poll, breaking the ITF top 25 for the first time in two years. Last year, the women finished seventh at the UAAs, while the men’s team notched sixth place.

The women’s team is heading into the UAA weekend in a strong position, currently ranked 13th in D-III, though the men’s team — who finished at No. 42 in last year’s NCAA Championships — remains unranked. 

“A lot of the guys who have been mainstays of the program over the last four years, who can score a lot of points, are currently injured,” Shipley said. “The men’s team is probably not operating at complete capacity.” 

Daniel Lee, a senior thrower with disciplines in shotput and discus, is one such veteran athlete recovering from injury this season. Regaining strength and focusing on technical training, he hopes to flourish at the conference, which he said he barely missed out on last year.

“I had a stint where I was declining in performance because I injured my hand,” Lee said. “We finally got about 98% of the strength back in my fingers. And now me and my coach both feel we’re at the point where I’m getting ready to peak right there at the conference.”

This year’s championships will be held in Waltham, MA — at the same venue Lee competed as a first-year, where he will aim to rewrite his ninth-place finish from last year’s conference championships.

Dawson, who notched a stellar fifth-place finish in last year’s 800m, will be competing with familiar faces and rivals. For her, the UAAs offer raw competition with less focus on strategy, due to the meet’s emphasis on overall rankings rather than individual times. 

“I can compare where I’m at now to where I was last year, and I feel a lot stronger and more confident,” she said. “It’s a unique time where we can just really compete and not focus as much on times.”

Following their No. 62 finish in last year’s NCAA Championship, the women’s team — now   second overall in the UAA standings — is poised for a better finish. 

The 2026 UAA Indoor Championships will be hosted by Brandeis University from Feb. 28 to March 1. 

Contact Sayako Ikeda at [email protected].