Oct. 30, 2013
SAN DIEGO -
2013 SDSU BEST TIMES | MOUNTAIN WEST NETWORK | MW CHAMPS PAGE
San Diego State begins its championship season Friday (Nov. 1) at the Mountain West Cross Country Championships in USAFA, Colo., near Colorado Springs. The 6,000-meter women's race is scheduled to start at 10:45 a.m. MT on the blue course at Air Force's Eisenhower Golf Club.
The 6K women's race and the men's 8K race (10 a.m. MT) will be broadcast live on the Mountain West Network at http://www.themw.com/#!/watch-live.
At last year's championship meet, the Aztecs finished in eighth place out of nine teams. SDSU's best team finish since the inception of the Mountain West in 1999 is fifth, which has happened three times - 1999 (out of eight teams), 2000 (out of eight teams) and 2005 (out of nine teams). This year's meet will feature a MW Championship-record 11 teams.
In the Mountain West Pre-Championship Coaches' Poll, San Diego State was picked ninth with 24 points. Ninth-ranked New Mexico earned the top spot with 99 points, followed by No. 20 Boise State (89), Air Force (81), Colorado State (62) and Utah State (61). Wyoming was picked sixth with 52 points, while Nevada (50), Fresno State (48), the Aztecs (24), San José State (20) and UNLV (19) rounded out the poll.
SDSU is coming off a runner-up showing at the Titan Invitational on Oct. 25 in Fullerton, Calif. It was San Diego State's fourth top-four placing in six meets this year.
Chelsea Kruthers was the Aztecs' top finisher for the third consecutive meet and took fifth out of 95 finishers in 17 minutes, 46.5 seconds over the 5K course. Kruthers was followed closely by Rachel Roesgen, who was seventh in a collegiate PR of 17:50.0. Katy Smith was the next SDSU runner to cross the finish line in 18th with her third straight PR of 18:22.2. Dynasty Gammage (18:28.1) was seconds behind in 20th, while Elaine Ribeiro also ran a third consecutive PR in 18:29.5 to take 23rd. Melissa Wendorf finished 50th with a 19:19.8 PR and Cali King broke 20 minutes for the first time in her collegiate career to take 66th in 19:57.2.
Scheduled to run at this weekend's championship meet, which will be San Diego State's first at the 6K distance this year, are Jessica Cygan, Gammage, Kruthers, Ribeiro, Roesgen, Smith and Wendorf.
The Aztecs were led by Marianne Hogan at last year's championship meet in Las Vegas, Nev., taking 23rd in 22:00.72 over the 6K course. Following Hogan were Laura Vazquez (38th, 22:33.90), Josefine Koskinen (45th, 23:05.72), Kruthers (51st, 23:20.96), Jessica McCall (53rd, 23:34.84) and Roesgen (57th, 23:47.59).
Results, photos and highlights from the race will be posted on TheMW.com following the meet with the results being posted later on GoAztecs.com.