Ballard, Peters Qualify for National Meet
God provided absolutely perfect weather on Saturday for the Faith Eagles Invitational. It was cool and crisp, bright and sunny, and a great day to run! The races included several unattached runners from area churches and other Faith students and faculty. Thank you to everyone who came out and helped make this a successful event!
Sophomores Kaitlyn Peters, Taylor Ballard, and Wendy Busenitz finished in the top 3 spots in the women's race. The Faith women ran in a pack at the front of the race, along with Wendy's younger sister, Janet Busenitz. Wendy set the pace for Kaitlyn and Taylor, and they followed her lead to run their fastest races this season by nearly a minute! Kaitlyn's time of 24:19 and Taylor's time of 24:23 qualified both of them to compete in the NCCAA National CC Meet in Mississippi in November...congratulations to them both! Wendy's pacing of the others was right on target and she finished 0.2 seconds behind Taylor with a time of 24:23.7.
Sophomore Dewey Rapson won the men's race with a time of 31:23, improving his previous season best by 1 minute 20 seconds! Junior Nathan Bruce finished sixth with a time of 38:59. This was Nathan's first collegiate cross country race, and he ran the course well.
A special thanks to Jack Arneson and the Faith women's soccer team for their help with reading off times and directing the runners around the course! Many of the runners expressed their appreciation and that they enjoyed the run. We hope to make this an annual event, so start training and join us next year!
This Saturday marks the last regular season meet for the Faith Cross Country team. Please pray for us as we travel down to Joplin, MO for the Ozark Last Chance Meet. Then about a week and a half later we will head to Jackson, MS for Nationals. Thank you for your prayers!