Harriers Race Well At Riverside

The men's and women's cross country teams continued their strong racing this past weekend at the UC Riverside Invitational. Running against primarily non-Division III competition, the men finished seventh and the women finished 14th out of 30 teams.

The women's competition was divided into two races due to the large field size and nine women toed the line for the first race of the day.  Seven of the nine ran personal best times for the 5K distance and the other two were only seconds off.  The team was led by Jennie Tavé (SO, St. Germain, France) who finished 44th with a time of 17:57.4 .  This was the eighth best mark in CMS history.  The majority of runners in front of Tavé were from Division I or nationally-ranked NAIA schools.  She was followed closely by Julia Rigby (SO, Tustin) in 18:02.1.  Alison Gushue (SO, Tustin) ran 18:37.6.  Rigby and Gushue also made the CMS top-25 times list in 10th and 23rd.  Additional personal bests were set by Kate Crawford (FR, Seattle, WA) in 18:48.1, Aubrey Zimmerling (FR, Lakewood, CO) in 19:02.8, Breanna Deutsch (SO, Sammamish, WA) in 19:15.5 and Laura Wyatt (FR, La Jolla) in 19:25.3.  CMS had the top three Division III finishers in the race.  The team finished behind seven Division I schools, a nationally-ranked Division II school, two post-collegiate clubs and the first-, second- and fifth-ranked NAIA schools.

The Stags, winners of last week's Redlands Invitational as were the Athenas, matched the fast times turned in by the women with 14 personal bests among the 22 competitors.  The team was led by Kris Brown (JR, Seattle, WA) who finished 40th with a time of 25:18.5.  This was the 12th best mark in CMS history.  He was joined on the CMS top-25 list by Brian Sutter (FR, Monroe, WA, 25:26.4), Georgi Dinolov (JR, Santa Cruz, 25:36.7) and Kramer Straube (JR, Menlo Park, 25:42.3) in 13th, 17th and 21st respectively.  Additional PB's were turned in by Rafer Dannenhauer (FR, Shutesbury, MA) in 26:02.5, Alex Poyhonen (FR, Del Mar) in 26:35.6, Quinn Chasan (FR, Mercer Island, WA) in 27:08.0, Bennett Naden (FR, Middleton, WI) in 27:23.1, Tim Baffi (FR, Moraga) in 27:24.8, Jeff Hemphill (FR, Pasadena) in 27:43.5, Russell Page (FR, Albuquerque, NM) in 28:02.8, Brian Conroy (FR, Sierra Madre) in 28:40.6, Tom Boerigter (SO, Waverly, IA) in 30:27.9 and by Kevin O'Neill (FR, Berkeley) in 31:07.0. CMS finished behind only five Division I schools and one Division II school and beat both nationally ranked NAIA schools.

The Athenas also had 10 competitors in the second race, which took place after the men's race, and added five more personal best times.  Isabel Bush (SO, Juneau, AK) led the team with a 28th place finish in 19:29.0.  PB's were also set by Elise Yoshida (FR, Rolling Hills) in 19:50.9, Marnie Hogue (FR, Mercer Island, WA) in 20:18.8, Alexa Teevens (SO, Pembroke, MA) in 20:41.5 and Sheila Bhardwaj (SR, Pittsburgh, PA) in 20:57.0.  CMS placed third in the open race behind two teams that chose not to run any of their runners in the first race.

CMS will have 10 men and 10 women compete this weekend at the Stanford Invitational.  The race is on Saturday, September 26 with the men racing at 10:50 and the women at 11:30.