Volume CXXXIII, Number 6 October 19, 2001 f

Women runners finish 13th at New Englands, ready for NESCACS
KRISTEN DUMMER
STAFF WRITER

The Bowdoin Women's Cross Country Team finished 13th in the Open New England Cross Country Championships last Saturday. The team traveled to Boston's Franklin Park, and getting there turned out to be quite an adventure.
The team relied on the always-trustworthy online directions website for the quickest route to Franklin Park. After some confusion, however, the Bowdoin runners made it to the meet at exactly 12:43 p.m., just in time for the 12:45 start!

Luckily, they were able to pull on their spikes as the bus found its way, and when they arrived, the women quickly piled out and raced for the starting line. Literally sprinting just to make the start, the Bears were unable to stretch or warm up.

Despite the stressful and unfortunate circumstances, the team's strength shown through, said junior Bre McKenna. The Polar Bears ran to a 13th-place finish over several Division I schools, such as Providence, Harvard, Brown and UConn.

Bowdoin finished fourth of all Division III schools at the event. The field consisted of 230 athletes from 33 colleges and universities all over New England.

The top five Bowdoin finishers, in order, were: Audra Caler '05, Libby Barney '03, Katherine Landry '05, McKenna, and Marybeth Sexton '05.

Caler was the furthest up in the pack, finishing 28th overall. Following her were Barney (77th), Landry (86th), McKenna (97th), and Sexton (124th).

McKenna spoke of the team's positive attitude, saying, "I don't think I heard one Bowdoin woman complain the entire day. It was a lot of fun and just goes to show how much strength there is on this team."

Barney had similar feelings. "Miraculously, in spite of our negative warm up, no one was hurt, and three people even ran PRs (personal records)," she said. "I think this just goes to show how strong our team is. Even adverse situations such as that didn't get us down."

The women's cross country team will compete in NESCACs one week from tomorrow. Bowdoin has earned the honor of hosting the important meet this year, so be sure to come out and support your Polar Bears next Saturday at noon.