The UCLA men’s cross country team had a new member compete
last Friday at the CS Fullerton Titan Invitational. Freshman
Mohammed Qazi, in his first meet for the Bruins, led the team with
a third place finish.
Qazi joined the team two weeks ago as a walk-on. His
performance, along with sophomore Reggie Oronoz’s ninth place
finish, contributed to the men’s taking of second place at
the invitational held in Brea.
UCLA head coach Eric Peterson was very pleased with Qazi’s
performance. Qazi joined the team under very unusual circumstances
and since then has been very competitive both in practice and his
Friday debut.
“Friday he showed toughness,” Peterson said.
“He showed enough ability to add contribution to the
team.”
The race earned Qazi a chance to be in the pool of runners
representing UCLA at next week’s Pac-10 meet.
The women’s team also competed in Brea last Friday,
dominating the meet. Four Bruins placed in the top five, leading
UCLA to its first place victory.
Junior Valerie Flores won the women’s 5000-meter race with
a time of 18:12. Following in second was junior Tiffany Burgess,
freshman Laura Muller in third, and freshman Leslie Barrie in
fourth.
“This is a great indication of how far our program has
come” Peterson said. “A year ago we had a good
performance but didn’t dominate like this year. It’s
rare you nearly sweep a meet.”
The race was very competitive for the women. With the upcoming
Pac-10 meet this weekend, Peterson was confident of his leading
eight runners but unsure who would fill the remaining two spots. He
felt the only fair way to make the decision was to remain as
objective as possible. Based on the performances given last Friday,
Peterson has decided to run Flores and Muller to finish off
Saturday’s roster.
Several of both team’s top runners did not run in the race
Friday, using the weekend to prepare for Pac-10 competition. Both
teams will use the remainder of this week to rest before UCLA hosts
the championships this Saturday. The race will begin at 8:30 a.m.
at the Brookside Country Club in Pasadena.