Women's Cross Country | October 22, 2024
AIKEN, S.C. – The USCA women's cross country team is set for the upcoming PBC Championship, which will be held Oct. 26 at North Georgia.
Head coach
Marshall Leonard's team is coming off a fifth-place performance at the Sand Shark Invitational.
Gabrielle Jourdain guided the squad to the finish with her 16
th-place effort.
For Jourdain's hard work, she was named the PBC Runner of the Week after posting a time of 19:26.0 for the 5k event, which marked the second-fastest time in school history. It also marked the second time this season Jourdain has won the PBC accolade.
In addition to Jourdain's top time, the Pacers were guided by
Sydney Fallin's 25
th-place effort.
Emma Cox took 32
nd while
Tess Studley and
Ainhoa Colino were 35
th and 36
th, respectively.
Savannah Hill's 40
th-place performance rounded out the top five USCA student-athletes at the meet.
Studley has progressed all season long and the current 5k school-record holder looks to be in top form at the league meet. Fallin, Cox, Colino, Hill and
Jade Weber have improved throughout the season and will look to run personal-best marks at the conference meet.
Alaynah Guthrie, who missed the last race, will return to the line-up where she's coming off a personal-best time of 20:10 at the Queens City Invite.
"I am excited to see what the women can do as a group and individually," Leonard said. "We have not raced at full strength all season, due to a variety of reasons. Hopefully, within these next few days we can get everyone back healthy and ready to go for the Championships.
"The women are practicing really hard and taking advantage of all the athletic support that USCA has to offer. We have some really talented women on the team and they are a lot of fun to be around. The sky is the limit with them and they have the ability to reach any goal that they set for themselves. I'm looking forward to seeing them run their very best at the upcoming meet."
Last year, USCA took seventh at the PBC Championship and the squad will look to improve upon that finish this year.
