Roy Griak Invitational Page
ABILENE – The Abilene Christian women's cross country team heads to Minnesota Saturday to compete in the 32nd Roy Griak Cross Country Invitational hosted by the 19th-ranked Minnesota Golden Gophers.
The Wildcats enter this weekend ranked fifth in the South Central region for the second-consecutive week after defeating both Stephen F. Austin and Incarnate Word at last Saturday's running of the Naimadu Classic at ACU. Senior
Alexandria Hackett cruised through the Casi Florida 6K course in 21:15.32 to finish first, while her twin sister, Michaela, completed the race with a runner-up time of 21:24.24.
Redshirt sophomore
Carnley Graham clocked a time of 22:08, and rounding out the Wildcats' top five were senior Diana Garcia Munoz (22:23.05), and
Briahna Gerlach (23:15.19).
Expectations for the Wildcats in Minnesota are to finish among the top five even though they'll be battling a field composed of 17 schools, including top-25 programs from San Francisco (No. 8), Minnesota (No. 19), Michigan State (No. 20) and Iowa State (No. 23). Meanwhile, the list of regionally ranked schools features Arizona State, Colorado State, James Madison, Northern Illinois, South Dakota and South Dakota State, Toledo, UCLA and Wyoming.
Adding to the challenge will be a race day high temperature of 88 degrees (66 percent humidity), nine mph winds out of the south, and a golf-course based track that includes several significant climbs. The first is between the second and third kilometers, and then there's another right after the start of the fourth kilometer. ACU distance coach
Jarvis Jelen notes the changes in elevation will result in times 60 to 90 seconds slower than those posted on the flat-and-fast courses known throughout Texas.
The original start time was 1:20 p.m., but was pushed back to an 11 a.m. start due to the unusually high temperatures and humidity.
Last year's winning Griak 6K was 20:49 (36 teams), run on a muddy course with 14 mph winds. And in the three years prior (2015-13), the top times were 20:53 (26 teams with normal conditions), 20:34 (35 teams with normal conditions) and 20:35 (28 teams with some rain).
Lineup:
Sierra Bennett,
Alexandria Hackett,
Michaela Hackett,
Carnley Graham, Diana Garcia Munoz,
Briahna Gerlach,
Soren Underwood.
Teams: Arizona State, Colorado State, Drake, Iowa State, IPFW, James Madison, Michigan State, Minnesota, Nebraska-Omaha, North Dakota State, Northern Illinois, San Francisco, South Dakota, South Dakota State, Toledo, UCLA and Wyoming
Race Time: The ACU women will compete in the Jack Johnson Women's Gold race at 11 a.m. CT
Distance: 6,000 meters
Coach's Quote: "We are excited to travel to Minnesota to give our team and top individuals some big meet exposure early in the season," distance coach
Jarvis Jelen said. "This meet will allow us to learn more about our team's strengths and weaknesses before heading into an important block of training leading into Pre-Nationals in mid-October."
