Oct. 16, 2004
Terre Haute, Ind.-The No. 16 Baylor women's cross country team raced to a 14th place finish at the NCAA Pre-Nationals while the men's team ran to a sixth place finish at the Chile Pepper Invitational.
"Brittany (Brockman) and Jessa (Chance) ran extremely well," head cross country coach Todd Harbour said. "Jessa was our number two runner today and she responded with her best performance in two years."
Brittany Brockman led the way for the women, as she raced to a 13th-place finish at the NCAA Pre-Nationals. The sophomore ran the 6,000-meter course in a time of 20:58.0, just ahead of Missouri's Amanda Bales as she was the top Big 12 finisher at the event and set a personal record at the 6,000-meter distance.
Jessa Chance was the next Baylor runner to cross the finish line, as she finished in a time of 21:51.0 as she finished in 63rd-place. Monique Ortega provided the Bears with another top 100 finish as she crossed the line in a time of 22:11.3 to finish 99th at the event.
Lyndsy Bedell (107th, 22:14.9) and Brittany McGuire (144th, 22:35.2) also scored for the Bears at the meet. Alissa McKaig, running in her first event as a Bear, finished in a time of 22:48.2 to finish in 169th-place.
Baylor was without the services of Lauren Hagans, who had to pull out just before the race due to a knee injury.
Stanford captured the team title at the NCAA Pre-Nationals as the Cardinal's Alicia Craig captured the individual title in a time of 20:20.4.
On the men's side, Bo Price led the way for the Bears with his time of 30:20.1 over the 10,000-meter course to finish in 16th place.
Cody Wells also continued his string of strong performances for the Bears as he was the second Baylor runner to cross the finish line, finishing 23rd with a time of 30:48.0
Jason Baker (50th, 31:34.2), Chris Vidrine (54th, 31:36.8) and Luis Gutierrez (58th, 31:46.3) all captured top-60 finishes as the Bears finished just 11 points shy of a fourth-place finish.
Joel Sartain and Mitch Sanders rounded out the scoring for the Bears on the day, finishing in 61st and 68th, respectively.
Arkansas captured the team title at the meet as the Razorbacks' Josphat Boit won the individual crown.
Baylor will return to action on Oct. 30, when the Bears travel to Topeka, Kan., for the Big 12 Cross Country Championships.
