Oct. 11, 2012

Los Angeles, Calif. - This weekend the Bruins cross country teams will split their squads to compete in back-to-back meets on Friday and Saturday. On Friday, half of the men and women will run in the Wisconsin Adidas Invitational in Madison, WI and their teammates will run the following day in Santa Clara, Calif. at the Bronco Invitational.

The fourth annual Wisconsin Adidas Invitational is set to start at 10 am PT on the beautiful Thomas Zimmer Championships Cross Country Course just adjacent to the University Ridge Golf Course in Madison, WI. The course features an exterior loop of 2,500 meters and an interior loop of 1,000 meters, both of which cover the area's rolling hills and valleys as well as a section of dense woods. The first race will be the women's 6k championship race at 10 am, followed by the men's 8k championship race at 10:40 am PT.

This meet will feature a field of 46 teams on the men's side and 49 on the women's, including five other Pac-12 teams (Arizona, ASU, California, Stanford and Washington). The host team, the Wisconsin Badgers, come into this meet currently ranked atop the national polls among the men as well as ranked 29th in the women's polls. This meet looks to be the toughest yet for both Bruin squads, as it hosts a combined 40 of the nation's top 60 men's and women's teams.

But the Bruins, after having the last weekend off, are looking to capitalize on the extra practice time and are well prepared to build upon their strong results at last month's Pac-12 Preview. Junior Dustin Fay and sophomore Lane Werley, the top Bruin finishers at the Preview, will lead their group that consists of Sergey Sushchikh, Daniel Herrera, Chase Zukerman, David McDonald and Nohe Lema. Lema will be making his season debut this weekend in Madison. For the women, the group will feature Bronte Golick, Katja Goldring, Annie Mooney, Kelsey Smith, Sarah Toberty, Hannah Valenzuela and Caitlin Schmitt. The women welcome back senior captain Katja Goldring to the lineup after her absence in the Pac-12 Preview.

Last season, the Bruin women took 43rd at the Wisconsin Invite, led by the then-junior Goldring who finished the 6k race with a time of 21:43. On the men's side, the Bruins finished 12th in 2011 as senior Kent Morikawa finished 43rd overall. The team titles were claimed by the Wisconsin men (66 pts.) and the Washington Husky women (199 pts.).

Meanwhile, the other half of the men's and women's teams travel north to Santa Clara, Calif. where they will run in the Bronco Invitational at Baylands Regional Park. The invitational races kick off with the women's 5k race at 9:45 am followed by the men's 8k invitational at 10:30 am. The Bronco Invitational includes runners from host-Santa Clara, Stanford, Colorado, UCLA, California, Fresno State, Idaho State, Sacramento State, Saint Mary's, San Diego and USF.

The Bruin lineups will feature Lyndsey Mull, Kristina Rivera, Sierra Vega, Amber Murakami, Merissa Kado and Jen Owen for the women and Jacob Wood, Patrick Douglas Alec Govi, Daniel Rosales and Nick Hartle for the men. Last year, the men and women finished 14th and 15h, respectively.