For the first time this season, the Penn State women's indoor track squad will not be running in the familiar confines of the Horace Ashenfelter III Indoor Track at the Multi-Sport Facility. This weekend, the Nittany Lions take to the road as they travel to New York City to compete in the scored New Balance Collegiate Invite today and tomorrow.

The field includes top-tier teams such as South Carolina, Louisiana State, Texas and Stanford. Grouping Penn State with those high-class teams, coach Beth Alford-Sullivan hopes that Penn State can be competitive.

"We're excited to see how we stack up against them in the heat of battle," Alford-Sullivan said.

The Lions are coming off of a record-breaking performance at the Penn State National Open, where freshman Shana Cox set a Penn State 400-meter run record, and the team of Cox, fellow freshman Dominique Blake, sophomore Kamilah Salaam and senior Brooke Robinson broke the Penn State 4 x 400-meter relay record. The team hopes to use that momentum to jell as a team.

"We've prepped a team that last weekend, this coming weekend and next weekend back here at home, it's kind of the meat of our season," Alford-Sullivan said. "We want to really come together in each of those three competitions in preparation for the conference meet at the end of the month."

So far, it appears as if the team has been developing nicely, as it has been getting solid performances across the board. Throwers Kate Johnston and Jennifer Leatherman have finished in the top five at each event this season and Penn State continues to see improvement in freshmen, such as Cox and Blake. Another freshman, the multi-talented Gayle Hunter, has spent the week rehabbing from tendonitis in her knee, which she suffered at the Penn State National Open. She will return for this weekend's competition, though in a limited fashion.

"She's just going to long jump and run the hurdles at the meet in New York, and that's not as much strain as she's had on her knee at other times," Alford-Sullivan said. "We're giving her just a low-key weekend to get a chance to get some competition."

Overall though, Penn State will send a healthy team to compete this weekend, and Alford-Sullivan expects to see a balanced attack from her squad.

The New Balance Collegiate Invite replaces the usual Princeton/UPenn tri-meet on the schedule. Alford-Sullivan thinks that the schedule change reflects well on the Penn State track program.

"We've as a program outgrown the small meet like [the Princeton/UPenn meet]. We're ready for bigger and better competition," Alford-Sullivan said.

As for the first trip on the road, Alford-Sullivan is not worried in the least. Rather, she looks at the upcoming meet as a chance for her team to gain chemistry and useful road experience before the Big Ten Championships held at Michigan.

"We're looking at it as ... a good opportunity to get used to what life and competition is like on the road," Alford-Sullivan said. "We're getting ready for Ann Arbor even though we're just heading to New York right now."