ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – Representing UT Arlington on the national stage Friday night, Joel Bengtsson clocked the 2nd-fastest time of his career in the 60m hurdles prelims at the 2023 NCAA Indoor Track & Field Championships.
 
Bengtsson ran a 7.70 inside the Albuquerque Convention Center, but it was just .03 shy of being good enough to advance to the final on Saturday. Still, that time tied for the senior's 2nd best along with a performance in January at the Texas Tech Open, and was bested only by a Western Athletic Conference Championship record 7.68 he blazed to a gold medal two weeks prior.
 
Going up against one of the deepest hurdles fields in recent years at the NCAA Indoor Championships in which qualifiers had to run faster than a 7.70 just to get to Albuquerque, Bengtsson still finished ahead of competitors from Houston, Nebraska, USC, Iowa and Michigan.
 
The Landskrona, Sweden, native needed to either finish in the top-2 of his heat, or have one of the next four-fastest times in order to be one of the eight who moved on to the final, but the final 'at-large' spot was a 7.67 time.

Bengtsson – one of only two racers from a non-Power 5 school – didn't knock over a single hurdle, and only clipped the second-to-last hurdle en route to a strong performance which capped a decorated indoor campaign.
 
He broke a 25-year-old WAC record with the aforementioned 7.68, which also bettered his own school record. Additionally, Bengtsson was a two-time Sun Belt Conference Indoor Champion in the 60m hurdles, going back-to-back in 2020 and 2021.
 
He was looking to accomplish something only three others in the history of the UTA track and field program had done, but will now turn his attention to reaching the goal of winning a national championship during the outdoor season.
 
UTA Track & Field National Champions
Gilbert Smith
1982 Indoor – Long Jump (7.95m / 26-1)
McLinton Neal
1990 Outdoor – 400m Hurdles (49.23)
Alexus Henry
2018 Outdoor – High Jump (1.82m / 5-11½)

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