Orange Coast College

Cross Country: Pirates continue to set the pace

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

The Orange Coast College cross country teams have continued their dominant ways the past two weeks at the Vanguard Invitational on Oct. 10 and the Mt. SAC Invitational this past Friday.

Running against primarily four-year schools, the Pirate men topped the field at Vanguard with a team score of 65 points, while Westmont (82) and host Vanguard (95) placed third. On the women's side, Coast was runner-up with 74 points, while USC placed first overall with 47 points.

Ten OCC runners placed in the top 50 spots, including Sergio Olivarrias, who finished sixth overall with an 8K time of 25 minutes, 44 seconds. Teammate Russell Westphal was right behind Olivarrias, placing seventh with a time of 25:56. Other top-50 times for Coast include Jorge Torres (12th, 26:12), Jake Dawson (19th, 26:30), Michael Taylor (26th, 26:50), Francisco Baquero (30th, 27:04), Pedro Saucedo (31st, 27:07), Arthur Tang (36th, 27:18), Eric Dyson (27th, 27:19) and Garrett Fuerte (47th, 27:35).

On the women's side, sophomore Kimone Hewitt set the Pirates' pace on the 5K course and finished sixth overall with a time of 18:18. Other top-50 times include Andrea Guerra (12th, 18:29), Hillary Labelle (13th, 18:30), Jane Kerner (22nd, 18:47), Margaret McDuffee (30th, 18:58), Sara Toberty (37th, 19:14) and Andrea Gayton-Jacob (43rd, 19:21).

At the Mt. SAC Invitational, it was another dominating performance by the OCC men, who placed four runners in the top-20 for a winning team score of 75 points. Mt. San Antonio was second with 144 points, while Glendale (153) took third.

Again, it was Olivarrias who set the pace for OCC, placing sixth overall with a 4-mile time of 21:45. Saucedo finished seventh with a time of 21:47, while Westphal (22:26) and Dawson (22:27) each cracked the top 20. Other top-50 times include Dyson (26th, 22:34), Baquero (28th, 22:36), Tang (44th, 23:05) and Taylor (46th, 23:08).

In a matchup between two of the top women's programs in the state, the Pirates placed second overall to Glendale with 57 points. The victorious Vaqueros finished with 34 points, while Mesa (AZ) College took third with 132 points.

On the 3-mile course, Hewitt paced the Pirates and finished fourth with a time of 18:35, while McDuffee (sixth, 18:43) and Labelle (ninth, 18:56) each cracked the top-10. Other top-50 performances for Coast came from Gayton-Jacob (18th, 19:30), Sarah Tobert (22nd, 19:42), Sonya Ercout (30th, 20:02), Kerner (38th, 20:14) and Janina Emery (43rd, 20:25).

Coast will take the upcoming weekend off before competing in the 2009 Orange Empire Conference Championship, which will take place on Friday, Oct. 30 at Huntington Beach's Central Park at 9 a.m.