Following its success at the Illinois Invitational last Sunday, the Illinois’ women track and field team will head to the Kansas Relays.

The meet marks the 80th running of the relays, which will run Thursday through Saturday in Lawrence, Kan.

The women fared well last weekend, winning nine events and regionally qualifying in five. The team is looking for continued success at the relays.

“We’re trying to get the regional qualifiers again,” assistant coach Tonja Buford-Bailey said. “We have some people who are really close in some events. We’re looking to get Tiara Armstrong into the 100-meter and a few more into the 100-hurdles. We’re trying to get Omoye (Ugiagbe) a qualifier in the 400-meter; she’s pretty close right now.”

Even with all that’s looking to be accomplished over the weekend, the Illini had the misfortune of limited preparation time. After the Illinois Invite and the past few strenuous weeks of travel and weather, most of the team practiced only through Wednesday.

Alecia Beckford-Stewart left on Tuesday to compete in the heptathlon, and the rest of the team left to join her in Lawrence on Thursday.

“This week in practice, we were just recovering from the home meet,” assistant coach Karen Harvey said. “A lot of our kids doubled (in events last weekend), so there wasn’t a lot of work, just recovery. We did some sharpening and speed work. It’s that time of year where you’re not training as much. You just have to get ready to race.”

Even though the meet will feature individual events, including the 100-meter, 400-meter, 1,500-meter and jumping events, its focus will still be on relays.

“There’s a lot of looking to get times, but it is the Kansas Relays,” Harvey said. “It’s fun to win a relay with four other people and to win a relay championship where the greatest relays meet in the country. It’s a real privilege to win, so we came here to win.”

Two of the relays that the Illini should do well in are the 4×100-meter and the distance medley. The 4×100 will feature a team of Armstrong, LaNeisha Waller, Carlene Robinson and Yvonne Mensah. The distance medley team will consist of Katie Engel, Alondra Cooper, Rachel Hernandez and Angela Bizzarri.

“The distance medley is going to be a really good team,” Harvey said. “We’re going to be putting together our teams looking to win.”