It was a beautiful day for a cross country invitational this Saturday, as the Illinois Cross Country Club hosted the NIRCA Great Plains Regional at the University of Illinois Arboretum. The women”s team claimed their fourth straight regional title, while the men”s team was 2nd, in the final race before NIRCA Cross Country Nationals.
Megan McGreal ran her best race of the season to claim the individual runner-up spot, in a time of 23:05.6 for the 6K. Beth McGreal finished 3rd, running 23:24.0, followed by Megan Mocogni and Emma Grimes, who finished 5th and 6th in times of 23:36.3 and 23:42.7 respectively. Rounding out the scoring 5 for the team was Michelle Turner, running 24:40.1, good enough for 8th place over all.
Despite coming up short in the team battle, the men”s team still turned in some good performances. Mark Donohue led the team with a 5th place finish, finishing the 8K course in 25:56.1. Jim Riddle (8th, 26:11.7), Eric De Guevara (9th, 26:32.2), Jared Ripoli (10th, 26:33.5), and Evan White (11th, 26:44.2) swept the 8th through 11th spots to complete the team scoring for the men.
Next up is the final race of the season, the 2013 NIRCA Cross Country Nationals in Hershey, PA, on November 16th. The women”s team looks to build on their strong regional performance, and a 7th place finish last year on the difficult course, while the men will try and rebound from their runner-up finish this weekend, and improve on last year”s 4th place finish.
Results
