FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. - In their first running of the nationally prominent 19th Chile Pepper Festival the Tulane cross country team took 16th place in the 41 team field, as the Green Wave were led by Keriann Langley, Laurie Dalrymple and Rebecca Coady Saturday in the event hosted by the University of Arkansas.
The Green Wave started off well, running the first mile in an average time of 5:41, but the times rose from there. Langley, a senior from Metairie, led the Wave for the first time this season and finished with a time of 22:21.4. She was followed by freshmen Dalrymple (22:36.7) and Coady (22:48.8) running in their typical second and third spots for their team. Senior Aubrey Phillips placed fourth on the team with a time of 22:54.0, and senior Jill Shriver finished the scorers for Tulane with a time of 24:08.5. Senior Rachel Bryan (25:00.5) ran in the sixth spot for the Wave.
"We did okay. On a scale that runs between really excellent and completely horrible, we did just above average," Tulane head coach Heather Van Norman said. "But, I'm not disappointed. We can always get better. We can always get better and we will. Sometimes you burn a lot of coal and you run out of coal. Now, we just have to put more coal into the machine."
 |
As a team, Tulane scored 429 total points and averaged a time of 22:57.9 by their top five scoring runners. The 41 team field is the largest the Green Wave has faced all season.
After a week in which the student-athletes had multiple midterms the runners felt physically and perhaps more emotionally tired, and ran in the same manner. The team was not making excuses, however, as they continue their preparation for the Conference USA Championship meet in two weeks. Van Norman repeated a familiar refrain that everything is about preparing for the conference meet.
On Oct. 27, the Green Wave will travel to El Paso, Texas, for the C-USA Championship Meet hosted by UTEP. For more information about the C-USA meet and for all cross country news, visit www.TulaneGreenWave.com.