Senior cross country runner Valerie Flores summed up the general
feeling of the UCLA women’s cross country team after
Saturday’s NCAA Western Regional meet in Portland, Oregon.
“It’s a good day to be a Bruin,” she said. That
was definitely true for the women’s cross country team this
weekend. With the top five Bruins earning All-Regional honors, UCLA
placed second at the meet, gaining one of only two automatic bids
to the NCAA Finals. This is the first time the women have
accomplished this feat in coach Eric Peterson’s eleven-year
tenure. “(Peterson) talked about (placing in the top two) for
so long,” Flores said. “This weekend we were able to
prove it to him and to ourselves.” The Bruins finished with a
total of 69 points. Stanford won the meet for the fifth straight
season with 45 points, with Cardinal Alicia Craig winning the
individual title for the second year with a time of 20:06. Flores
led the Bruins, placing fourth overall with a time of 20:30. After
narrowly losing to Arizona State two weeks ago at the Pac-10
finals, this weekend the Bruins dominated the Sun Devils, who came
in a distant fourth with 112 points. “I went out there to
beat every Arizona State person that I saw,” redshirt
freshman Ashley Caldwell said. “It was a great race all of
the way through. Everybody was willing to put everything out there.
We left everything on the course.” This improvement came
after two weeks of determined training by the Bruins. “The
intensity was there,” Flores said. “We all came and
totally handled the intense practices.” Peterson said,
“My kids had two of the best weeks of training that
I’ve ever seen a team have as a coach.” Another factor
in the women’s improvement was the difference in the
Regionals course as opposed to the Pac-10 course. Compared to the
cold weather and hilly terrain of the Pullman, Washington meet, the
conditions at Regionals were more favorable for the Bruins, who are
predominantly middle-distance runners. “It’s a course
that suits our style of runners,” Peterson said. “They
thrive on the consistent running patterns that long, straight
stretches of running allow for.” They certainly did thrive.
Each of the top five runners improved her time by at least 20
seconds. Sophomore Jenna Tominski improved her time by over two
minutes, running the course in 21:30, good enough to earn 21st
place. Caldwell placed 11th in 20:30, true-freshman Alison Costello
placed 14th in 20:53, and senior Melissa McBain placed 25th in
21:11. The top 25 meet finishers received All-Regionals honors.
“It was great to see the effort of the kids recognized at the
highest level,” Peterson said. Not having to worry about an
invitation to Finals gives the Bruins a chance to recuperate and
begin to focus on the upcoming Championships, to be held Nov. 24 in
Northern Iowa. “It’s a much better feeling knowing you
are going to go to Nationals than worrying until Monday about
whether you are going to get an invitation,” Peterson
said.
MEN’S CROSS COUNTRY: The men’s cross country team
finished seventh place at Regionals with 178 points. Stanford won
the meet for the eighth consecutive year with 18 points.
Stanford’s Ian Dobson won the individual title, running the
10K course in 29:32. The Bruins were led by junior Erik Emilsson,
who placed 17th in 30:13. Junior Jon Rankin finished 24th in 30:23.
Both earned All-Regional honors. This was the last race of the
season for the men’s team. There is a remote chance that
Emilsson will get an individual invitation to Nationals. The top
four men not on automatically-qualifying teams advance
automatically as individual competitors. Emilsson will be notified
today.