Men's and women's cross country have great day out at Bronco Invitational

Saturday, October 16

Baylands Park - Sunnyvale

UC Santa Cruz Athletics

Santa Clara Bronco Invitational

Muzzy (L) and Anderson were the top Banana Slug finishers in Sunnyvale

Men's and women's cross country have great day out at Bronco Invitational

10/17/2021 7:52:00 AM | Women's Cross Country

Women place Second, men seventh against loaded field.

SUNNYVALE - Racing once again as the lone Division III team in a packed field, UC Santa Cruz's Cross Country squads had a tremendous showing at the Bronco Invitational in Sunnyvale.

With eight runners in the Top 50, the women placed 2nd out of 12 schools for 75 points, behind only host Santa Clara and ahead of two Division I squads and three from Division II.
Senior Elana Muzzy was the top UCSC runner, finishing the 6K in 23:16.9 to place 18th. Riley Martel-Phillips was four seconds behind her to finish 22nd and Andrea Gallardo was 24th in 23:34.2.
Hanna Hekkanen was 28th with a PR of 24:00.7, Sage Simms was 38th in 24:16.4, Lauren Delgado (24:31.7) and Emma Cadena (24:37.0) both PRd ior 44th and 46th respectively, and Monica Fonseca was 50th in 24:47.5.
Lindsay Rule (25:16.1), Sofia Placias (25:52.1), and Gigi Garcia (26:22.3) rounded out the UC Santa Cruz contingent.

"With so many changes over the last two years, it was nice to get to a familiar setting at the Bronco Invitational," said head coach David Klech. "Our women did a great job today, placing 2nd in the open section, and it was really nice to get our whole women's roster at the same meet. Elana, Riley, and Andrea executed their race plan up front, and it was great to get Hanna back in the lineup today.

A youthful men's team placed seventh out of 13 schools in the Open 8K. Freshman Eric Anderson had a PR of 26:21.3 to finish 61st out of 190 runners. Casey Orton was 69th in 26:35.1, Dylan Cronin placed 87th in 26:52.6, and Adam Goldberg was 1003rd in 27:13.7.
Nick Sciole (27:35.2), Camden Hebert (27:48.0), Micah Herbert (28:07.5) and Will Daschbach (28:25.8) also ran well for the Banana Slugs.
"Our Men have been putting in some great work in training since Louisville, so we rested a number of our top guys and allowed some of our underclassmen to get another race under their belts, and really see who is ready to step up for the Championship portion of our season," Klech explained.

The Banana Slugs return to Baylands Park in two weeks when they host the Coast-To-Coast Championship.
"We're excited to be back in Sunnyvale in two weeks for the first-ever C2C Cross Country Championships, and I know we will be ready to battle against our East Coast members" said Klech.