Peoria, Ill. ? The Bradley Braves are among 31 schools converging on Iowa City, Iowa, November 12th, for the 2005 NCAA Division I Cross Country Midwest Regional at the University of Iowa's Ashton Cross Country Course.
Births in the 67th NCAA Men's Cross County Championship and the 25th NCAA Women's Cross Country Championship are at stake for a field that includes five schools that qualified for the 2004 NCAA Championships, including Missouri (W/11th in 2004), Illinois (W/20th), Iowa (M/13th), Minnesota (M 18th), and Oklahoma State (M/30th).
Bradley head coach David Beauchem has high hopes for Saturday's regional and feels that the key to any team's successes at this point in the season lies in its physical condition.
"The most important aspect of competing well at the regional meet is being healthy. So many times, at this point in the year, it is not necessarily the best team who wins, it is the healthiest."
The Bradley men enter the 10K regional competition running well after recording seven season-best times at the MVC Championships, Oct. 29th.
Sophomore Chris George (Normal, Ill./University) leads a group of five Bradley freshman and sophomores coach Beauchem expects to continue to pace the Braves.
Beauchem is confident his underclassmen's ability to lead the charge.
"I feel like the men's team is really ready for a great race. We have had a very good last 6-7 weeks of training and easing up this past week has really put us in a good position. We can definitely improve on what we did at the MVC meet two weeks ago. I look for us to be in the upper half (top 15)."
“I expect the freshman - sophomores to continue to lead us this weekend.” ? George, freshman Nathan Ahart (Chesterfield, Mo./Parkway Central), freshman Pat Greene (Joliet, Ill./Plainfield South), sophomore Nathan Leech (Fremont, Neb./Fremont), sophomore Nick Palumbo (McHenry, Ill./McHenry)
The women's team will run through injury and illness in the 6K at Iowa City as they look to build off of their MVC performance.
"The women really ran a great race at the MVC meet to be 7th. The key for us this weekend is bringing the same energy level to Regional meet. I expect us to compete in the top 20 teams. We just don't have any margin for error with our team scoring." Beauchem said.
Junior Sarah Westrick (Livonia, Mich./Winston Churchill) owns the Braves' best time of the fall in the 6K and will be called upon to lead the charge with the team's current physical ailments.
“I expect Sarah Westrick, Bekah Aavang, and Marcia Backstrom to lead us. Katie Nowak (foot) and Ainslie Schultz (flu) are going to have to step up and race well at less than 100%.”
The 2005 NCAA Cross Country Midwest Regional is scheduled to begin at 11:00 a.m. CST with the men's 10K race and will be followed by the women's 6k at 12:15 p.m. with the awards ceremonies to follow at 1:00 p.m.
Click here to visit the University of Iowa's 2005 NCAA Midwest Regional Championship information page.
Check back here at www.bubraves.com for complete meet results and recap.
