Lumberjacks Second at A&M Invitational
9/10/2005 12:00:00 AM | Cross Country
Sept. 10, 2005
COLLEGE STATION, Texas -- - The Stephen F. Austin Lumberjack cross country team finished second Saturday at the Texas A&M Invitational. Led by junior Cody Clark and freshman Teddy Fanta, who finished ninth and 10th, respectively, the Lumberjacks scored 54 points to take runner-up honors behind host team Texas A&M's perfect score of 15.
Clark crossed the line in the 8,000-meter race at 25:26, and Fanta chased him home four seconds later. SFA runners took four of the next six slots. Junior Chance Edwards was 12th with a time of 25:36, sophomore Robert Smith came across 13th with a time of 25:55, and freshmen Conor Gillen (26:00) and Aaron Hohn (26:05) took 15th and 16th, respectively.
"I was happy with our performance," SFA coach Lou Snelling said. "We wanted to have a good tune-up for some of our more important races, and we did that."
Snelling said he was pleased with the way his runners finished the race.
"As a whole, we fell asleep a little in the middle of the race," the coach said. "But Cody, Marc (Farris), Chance and Teddy ran the last two miles in under 10 minutes, which was very impressive."
Farris, a senior, finished fifth among unattached runners with a time of 25:28. Freshman Keith Mahipala and senior Julian Acuna also ran unattached and crossed the line together at 25:55.
"Keith ran his first collegiate 8K and had a pretty good experience," Snelling said.
Other SFA runners who competed in the meet included freshman Gerardo Moreno (26:32), junior Daniel Williams (26:42), freshman Matt Hernandez (27:04) and freshman Dustin Kelm (29:07).
"Finishing second is great, but where we finished today was less important than it will be later in the season," Snelling said. "The best thing we got out of this was the experience and the physical stimulation of racing."
The Lumberjacks will take next weekend off, while the SFA women's team heads to Houston for the Rice Invitational.
-- SFA --
