Neither rain nor sleet nor snow could stop the Cyclones from running personal bests and placing eighth out of 12 teams yesterday at the Bradley Pink Classic on the Newman Golf Course in Peoria.
Nearly every runner ran their best times in this final 6K race of the season. Calista Stefaniak led the way in 30th place in 24:31. Following her was Victoria Granz (54th, 26:16), Lupe Diaz (75th, 28:27), Carmen Villarreal (83rd, 29:38) and Natalie Moreno (90th, 30:32). This was Villarreal's first race back in a month, and she wasn't too far off of her PR.
"Temperatures were in the 30's, and it was snowing and raining during their entire race. They didn't let that or the hilly course get to them," said head Coach Dimitri Dimizas. "We wanted to see where we stacked up against Morton going into the championship race in two weeks, and we were able to beat them without one of our top runners. That gives all of us confidence that we can hold our own against the conference schools. We now have two weeks to fine tune and get everyone as healthy as possible. We still haven't had a meet where everyone was able to race, so I'm looking forward to seeing what we can do when everyone toes the line."