Oct. 8, 2007
SAN DIEGO -
San Diego State Cross Country Weekly Release in PDF Format
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Aztecs Travel North to Compete in Santa Clara Invitational
The San Diego State cross country team returns to action Saturday, Oct. 13, when it competes in the Santa Clara Invitational at Baylands Regional Park in Sunnyvale, Calif. The meet, which was originally scheduled for a 10:15 a.m. PT start, has been moved up 30 minutes and will now begin at 9:45 a.m.
The Aztec `A' team took last weekend off in preparation for Santa Clara with the `B' squad racing in La Jolla at UC San Diego's Triton Classic. SDSU finished in eighth place with five of its six runners finishing within 57 seconds of each other.
The 5,000-meter course on the southwest end of the San Francisco Bay is one that has been kind to the Aztecs. In 2005, SDSU won the team title and last season, Celeste Tyson set a new personal record, an effort which earned her Mountain West athlete of the week honors.
After this weekend's meet, San Diego State will race at the Cougar 5K Challenge in San Marcos, Calif., before playing host to the MWC Championships at Mission Bay.
Looking to Make it Five Straight
Lisa Naucler will look to make it five straight meets in which she has turned in San Diego State's fastest time. Last season, Celeste Tyson ended her collegiate career at SDSU by finishing first among all Aztecs in the final six races of the year. With a minimum of four meets left in the season, Naucler can match and surpass her former teammate's achievement before closing out her own career on Montezuma Mesa.
Aztecs at Santa Clara
Three current Aztecs have had experience running in the Santa Clara Invitational with
Lisa Naucler being the veteran of the trio. Naucler finished the race last season with a time of 18:38.40, good for 36th place, but her top performance was in 2005 when she came in seventh after clocking in at 18:02.19. The final pair to have run at Baylands are sophomores
Stephanie Armstrong and
Makenzie Mabry, who registered times of 19:03.10 (61st place) and 19:18.00 (73rd), respectively.
SDSU History at the Santa Clara Invitational
Since the 1998 season, San Diego State has only raced in the Santa Clara Invitational twice with both runnings occurring the past two seasons. In 2005, the Aztecs made a good first impression after they ran away with the team title with 31 points. That morning, SDSU had three athletes place in the top nine, six in the top 18 and all seven in the top 27. Former Aztec Lital Azulay won the meet with a time of 17:03.10, a meet record that still stands today. Another former Aztec, Lisa Crampton, was runner-up after she crossed the finish line in 17:34.23, a time that ranks fourth in meet history. Last season, SDSU finished seventh in a meet which saw five Aztecs set lifetime bests.
Recapping the Triton Classic
San Diego State placed eighth at the Triton Classic after completing the 6K course with 236 points. SDSU was led by freshman Michelle Martinez, who came in 50th place after crossing the finish line in 24 minutes, 49 seconds. Martinez, like the majority of her teammates, was competing in her first 6K of her collegiate career. Elizabeth Leonard was not far behind Martinez as she completed the race in 24:56 and was followed closely by Sara Cunningham who clocked in with a time of 25:08. Sara Beyers, coming off a personal record performance at the UC Riverside Invite, navigated the course in 25:38 with Lindsay Barajas checking in eight seconds later at 25:46.
New Face at the Top
Sara Cunningham moved to the top of San Diego State's 5K top-10 list two weeks ago at the UC Riverside Invitational. The first-year Aztec clocked in with a time of 18:56.10 seconds to finish in 58th place and first among all SDSU runners. Cunningham's effort was a personal record and moved her past Lisa Naucler, who held the top 5K time of 2007 through the first three meets. All told, Cunningham's time was over 17 seconds faster than Naucler's performance of 19:13.80 at the Fullerton Season Opener.
Fresh Faces
Besides Sara Cunningham grabbing the top spot on the 2007 Aztec top-10 5K chart after her performance at UC Riverside, Michelle Martinez, Elizabeth Leonard, Lindsay Barajas and Sara Beyers made their presence felt on the same list for the first time since the opening meet of the season. Entering this weekend's Santa Clara Invite, Martinez has run the third-fastest race of the season, while Leonard, Barajas and Beyers own the sixth, eighth and ninth-best times of 2007, respectively. This marks Martinez's and Beyers' second time on the season top-times list.
