Coach Nate Garcia said he was hopeful going into the meet, knowing his team was in a good place mentally and physically to make a strong showing.
“It may sound cliche, but you always go out looking to do a little bit better,” Garcia said the day before the meet. “And you know, you go for the win.”
The women’s team took to the particularly challenging UCSD home course first for its 6k run. Junior Chia Chang and freshman Michelle LeRoux went straight to the head of the pack at the starting gun and successfully fought to hold their positions the entire race, finishing in third at 22:17.5 and fourth at 22:18.9, respectively.
The Tritons did not record their fastest times at the meet, but the difficulty of UCSD’s course — replete with hills, valleys and dusty, muddy trails — differs dramatically from the flat grass fields where a lot of their other competitions have taken place.
This weekend, freshman Dani Brabender came in 10th, senior Aaryn Kobayashi came in 12th, junior Ximena Cruz came in 14th, senior Kathryn Turner in 15th, freshman Alia Bales in 18th and freshman Madison Tanner came in 20th.
The Tritons finished eight top 20 runners in a race composed of more than 120 athletes, and the Triton women easily took first place in the team component of the race.
This season, the women’s cross country team is ripe with young talent, and runners filled with the desire to better themselves and beat the girl ahead. And with six freshmen and only four seniors, the year can only get better as these “baby” Tritons mature.
The men’s team was led by junior Matt Lenehan, who stormed to a second-place finish with a time of 32:44 in the men’s 10k. Lenehan also led most of the race with a just a short stretch of ground between himself and the next pack of racers, which held almost the entire field of Triton competitors. UCSD finished 7th -10th, 12th -14th, 16th, 20th and 24th. Collectively, the Triton men performed very well, with their average time clocking in lower than 20 seconds than the next fastest team.
The men’s team is also in contention for regional dominance. The only question is if it can curb the behemoth that is Chico State, enough to finally knock it off its high horse before the conference championships on Oct. 22 in Santa Rosa.
