On Saturday, the Bruins showed small signs of improvement,
though those signs may be coming a bit too late.
The UCLA women’s cross country team traveled up to Palo
Alto over the weekend to take part in the Pac-10 Championships.
Against a talented field, the squad came in a somewhat
disheartening fifth place. Though the team had a number of bright
spots in the race, those spots may not be enough to bolster this
squad at this point in the season.
“This type of performance is still not good enough to
compete with the nation’s top teams,” UCLA coach Eric
Peterson said.
For the first time in nearly two years, the Bruins were not led
by All-American Ashley Caldwell, but by sophomore sensation Allie
Bohannon. Bohannon continued her breakout season with an eighth
place finish over the 6,000 meter course (20:47) to earn
All-Conference honors, the first of her young career.
“Allie was absolutely awesome for us today,”
Peterson said. “She is arguably the most improved runner in
the Pac-10, which is remarkable considering the fact that this was
just her fourth 6,000 meter race of her life.”
The senior Caldwell, who had a subpar race by her standards, was
not far behind, finishing in 15th (21:16). Two redshirt seniors
also showed improvement from previous races as Jenna Timinsky
(35th, 21:56) and Allison Hall (36th, 21:57) had bounce-back
performances. Sophomore Olga Aulet-Leon was also key, placing in
27th place (21:40), but despite the team’s small
advancements, Peterson knows his team needs to get better by leaps
and bounds, not baby steps, as the end of the season rapidly
approaches.
“The fact of the matter is that it isn’t enough to
be competitive,” Peterson said. “I am happy to see
improvement, but we need it to be more rapid simply because we are
running out of opportunities.”
Hoping for a third-place finish, the team instead was
overmatched against Oregon and Washington, two teams it had hoped
to defeat.
Traditional powerhouse and No. 1 ranked Stanford won the meet
easily, as expected, followed by No. 8 Arizona State.
“Oregon and Washington are just deeper than we are at this
point,” Peterson said.
The team now has two weeks off to prepare for the Western
Regional meet.