The NMHU cross country teams each placed 7th at the 2009 Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Championships Saturday in Denver. The meet was held at Washington Park in Denver and hosted by Metro State.
With five nationally ranked men’s teams and four nationally ranked women’s teams, the RMAC is the toughest cross country conference in the nation, according to HU head coach Bob DeVries. “We hoped to place a bit higher,” noted DeVries, “but this conference is so strong, if you don’t race at your best teams are going to move ahead of you.”
Top-ranked Adams State won (20) the 11-team meet with No. 2 Western State runner up (47) and No. 5 Colorado Mines third (100).
A bright spot for the HU program was the All-RMAC performances of Nicaise Kazingo and Moses Kirui.
Kazingo—last year’s RMAC Freshman-of-the-Year---followed up with a seventh place finish to grab First Team All-RMAC accolades. Kirui meanwhile led the 8-kilometer race for the first half before falling off the pace and finishing 16th, good for the first spot on the All-RMAC third team. “Moses got a little anxious and his inexperience showed, we wanted our top two to stalk the pace, not set the pace. Nicaise did a great job against the best guys in the country to hold on once Moses started dropping back,” said DeVries.
Sophomore Josh Garcia from Belen, NM (46th place) ran an outstanding race to finish as the Cowboys number three-man. Garcia has been running number five and six this season. “Josh was where I projected him, but I thought he would be our number five man. We needed the other guys to step up as well,” DeVries.
The HU women were led once again by the duo of Carolina Garcia and Ashley Lovato. Both Garcia and Lovato came into the race with hopes of cracking the top twenty, but the top pack pulled away early in the race and built too big a gap on the Cowgirls top two to bridge. Garcia would finish 27th and Lovato 34th out of 100 finishers in the RMAC championship.
Seniors Sandra Martinez (38th)and Reyna Montano (40th)finished out their RMAC careers with their best-ever finishes in the conference championship while former Robertson High School standout Brieanna Roper (68th)was the Cowgirls number five performer Saturday.
Number-four nationally ranked Adams (29) easily won with #14 Western (78) second and #11 Mesa State third (83).
Both the squads will race at the NCAA Central Regional on 11/7 in Wayne, Neb.
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