Men's Cross Country Closes Out Regular Season at Mesa Open

Saturday, October 22, 2022 - 2:45 pm | Dylan Kessler

Mesa, Ariz. - The Thunderbirds men's cross country team competed in their last regular-season meet, the Mesa Open, Saturday morning on their home course at the Southern & Dobson campus.

Every athlete improved from their previous home meet, the Mesa College Jamboree, just three weeks ago. Leading the way and finishing in first place was freshman Wyatt Williams (26:52.5), who improved by 1:19. Coming in second place was another freshman, Anthony Jones (27:21.3), with a huge improvement of 3:04. Coming in third was sophomore Masen Hofmann (27:47.7), who improved by 44 seconds. Freshman Samuel Van Alstine came in fifth with a time of 28:05.2 and improved by one second. Sophomore Owen Jackson came in fifth place with a time of 29:40.4 and improved by 13 seconds, and rounding out the T-Birds was sophomore Ivan Duran (sixth place), who ran a personal-best time of 29:52.3 on the 8000-meter course and improved by 2:40.

"The team had a goal that every student-athlete improve their marks from the Jamboree and they accomplished what they set out to do," said Assistant Coach Spencer Peterson. "I was impressed with the competitiveness that all demonstrated by virtually racing against themselves. This meet helped finalize our top seven as to who should be competing at the regional/conference championship meet next Saturday in Coolidge on the campus of Central Arizona College."

After next week's conference/region meet, the T-Birds will close out the 2022 season at the NJCAA Division II National Cross Country Championships in Tallahassee, FL, on November 12th.