Griz aim for continued progress heading into final regular-season race

The Grizzlies will hit the course again on Saturday, marking back-to-back weekends of running as the cross country teams gear up for the Big Sky Championships later this month. Montana will run on Saturday at the LC State Invitational in Lewiston, Idaho.

The meet will feature a plethora of competing teams, including Bushnell, Central Washington, Eastern Oregon, Gonzaga, Idaho, Lewis-Clark State, Montana, Washington State and Willamette. The women will run a 5k race, beginning at 11:30 a.m. (MT), followed by a men's 8k at 12:30 p.m.

"We're looking forward to a good test this weekend," said coach Doug Fraley. "We'll be rubbing elbows with some pretty good teams, so are goal is to continue to improve our times and make progress."

Last weekend, while hosting the Montana Open, the Grizzlies had their best meet of the season. Of the 13 Griz runners, 12 finished with lifetime-best times.

"The kids ran fast," Fraley said. "Because of the limited number of teams, it turned into more of a glorified time trial, but the kids ran fast, which is exactly what we wanted. We've seen nice, incremental improvement each week so far."

Annie Hill, a Kalispell native who transferred to Montana after beginning her collegiate career at Colorado, won the women's 5k race with a time of 17:13.3. The time was nearly a full minute better than she ran 2 weeks ago, in her Griz debut. Of the 17 attached runners, Montana had the top five times and six of the top seven.

Following Hill was Bridget Boyle (18:19.1), Iris McKean (PR 18:24.8), Kayla Ingraham (PR 18:25.9) and Jaylyn Hallgrimson (PR 18:38.1).

In the men's 8k race, Nathan Carter finished first among 14 attached runners (PR 23:58.3), leading a group of six Grizzlies who all finished ahead of the next-closest competitor. Following Carter was Rogelio Mares (PR 24:32.8), Will Dauenhauer (PR 24:44.4), Cooper Morris (PR 25:08.5), Colin Shaules (PR 25:22.0) and Brady Woods (PR 25:25.7).

Carter had never before broken 25 minutes, let alone 24, finishing 1:41 better than he ever had before. It was a theme for the group, as all six men recorded lifetime-best times, many by wide margins.

While there will not be live results for Saturday's meet in Lewiston, there will be a camera at the finish line, which will be broadcast on Facebook. Saturday will be Montana's final tuneup before getting a couple of weeks to prepare for the Big Sky Championships, which will be run Oct. 29 in Spokane, Washington.

University of Montana Athletics

Griz aim for continued progress heading into final regular-season race

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