Courtesy: NC State Senior Anne Wheatly ran third Friday to help NC State to an easy win in the Raleigh Invitational.
RALEIGH, N.C. — The rain came down sideways at times, but NC State’s men’s and women’s cross country teams ran full speed ahead Friday afternoon at the SAS Complex in Cary, rolling to easy wins in both the men’s and women’s collegiate races at the 2007 Raleigh Invitational.
The NC State women, with several starters running unattached, still managed to dominate the womens’ collegiate race, although not to the extent that the men did. The Wolfpack ran 2-3-4-7-14 for a score of 30, besting East Carolina by 15 points. Hampton was third with 77 points, followed by St. Augustine’s at 104 and Winston-Salem State at 115.
ECU’s Brittany Copeland won the individual 5k race in a time of 18:22, nine seconds ahead of NC State’s Jenn Ennis. The Wolfpack’s Anne Wheatly was third at 18:38, and Magin Kebert was fourth at 18:49.
NC State was without starters Angelina Blackmon, Brittany Tinsley and Bona Jones, All-ACC performers a year ago who ran the race unattached.
“We had several kids out of uniform, so it’s kind of hard to evaluate the results,” women’s coach Laurie Henes said. “The conditions made it even tougher. It was good to see Anne Wheatly and Jenn Ennis run at the front of the pack like they did. That was encouraging.”
The NC State men, ranked 10th nationally in the latest TFCCCA poll,
took the first five places in their race to score a perfect 15. John
Martinez, Wes Smith and Chris Kollar ran 1-2-3. Martinez ran the 5k
race in a time of 15:08 and officially finished one second ahead of
Smith and Kollar. Bobby Mack and Robert Bedsole were fourth and fifth,
respectively, with identical times of 15:31.
“The conditions were not ideal,” men’s head coach Rollie Geiger said.
“It started pouring rain about two minutes into the race so it’s hard
to really evaluate our performances. We went with two particular goals,
to run as a group and to run in front, and we did both. So I’m pleased
with that.”
Wake Forest was second in the team standings with a score of 63,
followed by East Carolina at 118, North Carolina A&T at 135, UNC
Pembroke at 153.
Courtesy: NC State
