Oct. 10, 2009

Central women post perfect score for title

CEDAR RAPIDS—The Central College women’s cross country team took the top eight places at the Coe Lamb-Kohawk Invitational Saturday morning, scoring a perfect 15 points to capture the team title.

Angie Berry (senior, Norwalk) continued her strong fall, winning the meet with a time of 24:35 and leading a slew of Dutch runners to their second invitational victory of the season. Seniors Amy Ledvina (Tama, South Tama HS), Amber Mayer (Essex, Shenandoah HS), and Hannah Anderson (Goodell, Garner-Hayfield HS) finished second (25:01), third (25:02), and fourth (25:11), respectively, while Mel McDermott (freshman, Britt, West Hancock HS), Rachelle Tipton (senior, Newton), Melanie Louis (sophomore, Davenport, Central HS), and Meghann Burt (Slater, Ankeny Christian HS) took the fifth through eighth spots, finishing in 25:15, 25:37, 25:51, and 25:54, respectively.

The Dutch dominated the field, with Coe scoring 50 points to take the runner-up spot.

“It was a nice low-key meet for our women before Wis.-La Crosse next week,” said head coach Joe Dunham.

The Central women took an unconventional approach to attack the course, running in large packs with designated underclassmen leaders. The groups ran together for the first four kilometers before separating. Dunham was pleased with the results.

“The women’s race went exactly as we planned it,” said Dunham. “It was a great opportunity for some of our freshman to lead and get experience in that role. Mel (McDermott) did a great job with that front pack.

Clark leads men – Senior Teddy Clark (Montgomery, Ill., Oswego HS) finished third (27:10) and led the Central men’s squad to a second place finish behind host Coe.

The Dutch placed three more in the top ten, including John Gonzalez (freshman, San Antonio, Texas, Brackenridge HS) in fifth (27:48), Pierre Taylor (senior, Montgomery, Ill., Oswego HS) in sixth (27:49), and Andrew Hamer (sophomore, Murray) in eighth (27:51). Austen Vondracek (junior, Swisher, Cedar Rapids Prairie HS) rounded out Central’s scoring runners with an 11th place finish (28:16). Central scored 32 points, nine behind Coe’s 23 points.

“The men continue to improve”, said Dunham. “Today was a nice benchmark against some conference competition.”

Dunham cited Gonzalez for his composure.

“John (Gonzalez) had a great race today, he said. “He got after it and ran most of the race out in front of the second pack. They came up on him near the end but he fought most of them off. That showed a lot of maturity.”

Both squads have just a week off before travelling to West Salem, Wis. for the Jim Drews/Tori Nuebauer Invitational hosted by Wis.-La Crosse Saturday morning.