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MEMPHIS, Tenn. --
The University of West Alabama cross country teams took
a giant step forward with their performances in the
Memphis Twilight Classic this past weekend.
The men’s team showed
some major improvement in their 8K race at the Mike Rose
Soccer complex as the Tigers had their best team finish
of the year at 15th.
“I was really
pleased with our guys’ in this race," said head coach
Don Medeiros. “We have been training very hard recently,
doing a good bit more speed-oriented interval work, and
it started to show up in this race. Each guy ran a PR in
this race and freshman Alex Brown (Tupelo High School)
set a new school record of 26:43. Fellow freshman Jeremy
Wilson (Hewitt-Trussville High School) finished the near
five-mile race in 27:49, bettering his former PR by more
than two minutes. He was closely followed by senior
Randy Putman who crossed the line in 27:58. Junior
Daniel Ross (Wallace State- Hanceville CC) also had a
2-minute PR with his time of 28:08. Freshman Craig
Warlick completed a 2-minute and 20” PR by running a
28:33. Sophomore Deivid Delgado (Hoover High School)
completed the UWA effort with a time of 29:45 – breaking
30 minutes for the first time in his career."
“All year long we
have been talking about moving up in the GSC and
regional standings and this race showed that we are on
track to meet this goal. If we can keep up the quality
of our training over the next few weeks, I think we will
be able to run a competitive conference race and make
our mark at the NCAA Regional in November. It is not
very often that an entire team can run PR’s in the same
race, but the conditions were just right this weekend.
The night was cool, the course was fast and there was
some elite competition. When combined with the training
the guys have been doing, everything came together
nicely in this race.”
“It is important
for us to not be satisfied with our results from this
race. It is fine to be happy about the results but I
want us to remain hungry for more – these guys have more
to accomplish and have more inside them to give. We are
going to focus our training on race preparation even
more in the next few weeks. The guys realize they have a
chance to be the best UWA team in a long time and I
think they are willing to pay the price to achieve that
goal."
The women’s team was
not at full strength due to illness and family
emergency. Only three members of the women’s team made
the trip to Memphis, but they acquitted themselves well.
Freshman ReShai Reeves (Atlanta, Ga.) ran a PR of 21:24.
“ReShai got caught
up a bit in the excitement of the race, I think. She
went out a bit fast and struggled in the middle of the
race, but she competed and I was proud of her for that."
Fellow freshman
Debbie Shisler (Phoenix, Ariz.) also ran a PR with a
time of 22:18. The final UWA runner was Crystal Leamons
(Atlanta, Ga.) who was competing in her first race of
the season and finished in 22:52.
“Crystal is coming
off of a broken leg and has only been training for a few
weeks, so her performance was quite good. She was a
state championship level runner in high school and is
capable of running much faster than she did this
weekend. We have exercised extreme caution in her
training, limiting her to about 20 miles a week so far.
We will add some mileage in the next few weeks and I
think we’ll see some improvement in her times. By next
year she should be back at full strength and be up front
in races, competing with the leaders."
The Tiger harriers'
will train for the next two weeks in preparation for the
GSC championship meet on October 21, in Huntsville, Ala. |
