CROSS COUNTRY

The HU cross country program split sites this weekend. The Forester women, behind Shelby Christman’s first place finish, took fourth at Taylor’s Ray Bullock Invitational on Friday while the Huntington men finished fourth at the John McNichols Invitational hosted by Indiana State on Saturday morning.

Christman led the pack of 166 runners at the TU Cross Country Farm by turning in an 18:10. Five seconds separated her from second place finisher Sabrina Baftiri of St. Francis (IL). Classmate Abby Mays crossed the line next for Johnson’s crew in 19:09 for 12th place.

Carmen Trier ran a solid race to finish 38th in 20:14. Emily Tedder (20:44) and Olivia Von Gunten (20:45) had back-to-back finishes to claim 50th and 51st respectively. Other racers for Huntington included Lauren Craig (83rd, 21:57) , Shaylynn Reyes (113th, 23:07) and Morgann Hart (159th, 28:37).

“This was a much more challenging course than last week but we still had some really good performances,” noted Coach Lauren Johnson. “What’s more important than Shelby winning today was that she ran a much more conservative race. She was more competitive and beat some of the top runners in the country which includes going up against the defending national champions in St. Francis.

“Abby and Carmen also had very good days. While the team struggled  a bit after that, I’m confident we’ll see improvement from our four and five and when that happens we’ll be in good spot as a team.”

St. Francis (IL) took the women’s title with 33 points followed by Cornerstone (65), Taylor (70), HU (136), Grace (153), Cumberland (176), Spring Arbor (214), Goshen (220), Michigan-Dearborn (237), IWU (272), Anderson (322), Franklin (336), Lourdes (340), Concordia (367) and Oakland City (420).

On the men’s side, the three teams to beat the Foresters were NCAA Division I programs. The average time of HU’s top five finishers was a 26:10 with Haile Stutzman leading the charge with a 24:32 good for fourth place overall out of 149 runners. The Oregon native’s average pace per mile was 4:56.

Kent Yoder navigated the LaVern Gibson Championship Cross Country Course in 25:20 to take 14th. Elijah Chesterman was next for the Foresters in 26:26 for 26th place. Johnson’s other two scorers were Aaron Hendryx (37th, 27:04), and Matthew Hyter (45th, 27:32).

Other finishers for HU included Jonah Lemmon (52nd, 27:59) and Austin Liepe (57th, 28:22).

“Our top three ran well,” noted Johnson. “Haile and Kent ran very smart races. They didn’t go out too fast and just kept moving up to beat some really talented runners along the way.

“After our top three, we ran with tired legs. We will continue to put in the work so by the end of the season we’ll be able to freshen up a bit. Overall, we had a great day.”

Purdue won the 8K men’s crown followed by IU (55), Eastern Illinois (55), HU (126), Indiana State (143), DePauw (171), Lansing CC (223), Maryville (243), Madonna (282), Rose-Hulman (300), Evansville (300) and Vincennes (335).

Huntington is hosting its own Invitational on October 1.