Athenas Third, Stags Ninth At Willamette Invitational
The men's and women's cross country teams traveled to Salem, OR over the weekend to get a preview of the regional course and both teams had solid performances. Running in the 'Cardinal' races against Division II, Division III and NAIA competition, the women finished tied for third with 215 points and the men finished ninth with 254 points. Scoring each race with just Division III finishers, the women finished first and the men finished third.
The Stags ran first and had their top five runners finish an impressive 19 seconds apart. Bryan Chow (FR, Livermore) was the top finisher in 48th place with a time of 26:05.7. He was followed closely by Florian Scheulen (JR, Encinitas) 56th in 26:11.0, Dillon Ayers (SO, Eureka) 60th in 26:18.9, Kramer Straube (SO, Menlo Park) 63rd in 26:20.6 and Chris Gurney (SR, Ventura) 67th in 26:24.8. The first four finishers set personal bests for the 8K (4.97 mile) distance as did Matt Kurtis (JR, Bellingham, WA) 26:47.8, Kyle Stewart (SO, Redwood City) 26:49.7 and Dan Evans (FR, Missoula, MT) 28:42.4. CMS, ranked third in the region, scored 68 points in region-only scoring. Willamette University and Whitworth University would have tied for first with 61 points.
The Athenas followed up their impressive performance last weekend at the UC Riverside Invitational with another strong showing. Despite running without their third finisher from UCR (Katie Harris (SR, Bremerton, WA) was taking the LSAT), the Athenas tied Whitman College for third place overall. CMS finished behind only Chico State (#4 Division II) and Lewis-Clark State (#13 NAIA). In region-only scoring CMS scored 83 points with Whitman scoring 87 and Willamette and Whitworth tying with 90. Based on this performance, CMS moved from third to first in the West Region rankings. CMS was again led by Evelyn Ross (SR, Iowa City, IA) who finished 12th in 18:23.9 despite being sick. Julia Rigby (FR, North Tustin) was 17th in 18:36.0. The Athenas then had two tight packs of four runners. Ashley Scott (SO, Battle Creek, MI), Ally Rueschenberg (JR, Avila Beach), Lacey McLean (FR, Gig Harbor, WA) and Rachael Martin (SR, Pasadena) finished in a 1.6 second span between 19:32.2 and 19:33.8. Ida Nordestgaard (FR, Gig Harbor, WA), Kelly Garton (FR, Los Gatos), Sara Sholes (FR, Pacific Creek) and Emery Hilles (FR, Eugene, OR) finished in a 1.4 second span between 19:59.9 and 20:01.3. Rueschenberg, Martin and Sholes all set personal best for the 5K (3.1 mile) distance.
The teams take this weekend off from racing before starting SCIAC competition on October 18. Both teams will face-off with the rest of the SCIAC in the Multi-Dual Meet at La Mirada Park. The men race at 9:00 with the women following at 9:45.
