Jan. 31, 2013
SAN DIEGO -
Freshman Laura Vazquez will represent San Diego State at the 2013 USATF Junior Cross Country Championships Saturday in St. Louis.
Vazquez will compete in the Junior Women's 6K, which begins at 11:30 a.m. CT. The junior race, where all competitors must be under the age of 20, features some of the best high school and college freshmen in the country. The top-six finishers in the event will qualify to represent Team USA at the IAAF World Cross Country Championships in Bydgoszcz, Poland, on March 24.
Many of the top distance runners in America have competed in the USA Junior Cross Country Championships, including Jenny Simpson (Barringer) and Jordan Hasay for the women, and German Fernandez, Dathan Ritzenhein and Matt Tegenkamp for the men.
The 6,000-meter course at Forest Park, home of the 1904 World's Fair and 1904 Olympic Games, has been described as fast but fair with flat to rolling terrain and good footing.
Vazquez is coming off a fantastic freshman season with the Aztecs, where she was the top runner on the team twice and in the top four in all seven races. Vazquez finished with three top-five finishers, including a runner-up showing in her collegiate debut at the UCSD Opener on Aug. 31. She ended up taking 38th at the Mountain West Championships and 105th at the NCAA West Regional Championships, and posted collegiate-best times of 18:34.0 in the 5K (Oct. 19 at the Fullerton Invitational) and 21:40.0 in the 6K (Nov. 9 at the NCAA West Regionals).
Results will be posted on the USATF website after the race, while the live webcast can be found here.