Auburn Cross Country Teams Head to Arkansas for SEC Championships
October 28, 2004
AUBURN - The Auburn men and women's cross country teams traveled to Fayetteville, Ark., Thursday morning as they are set to compete at the SEC Championships on Saturday, Oct. 30.
The women's 6K race is set to begin at 9 a.m. at the Razorback Cross Country Course at Agril Park. The men's 8K will follow at 10 a.m. with the awards ceremony scheduled for noon.
The Tigers teams have not competed since the Oct. 11 Auburn
Invitational where both teams finished second and Angela Homan took home her third individual title this season. With three weeks to prepare for the championships, Homan will look to defend her 2003 SEC title.
"We have had three weeks of training to prepare," head cross country coach Chris Fox said. "The teams have trained hard and the weather has been outstanding for us so I think as a whole the group is ready to go."
At the 2003 SEC Championships hosted by Georgia, Homan became Auburn's first woman to take home an SEC cross country title. She ran the 6K in 21:49.76. In 2004, Homan has gone undefeated, winning races at the Georgia State Invite, Paul Short Run and most recently at the Auburn Invite. Her 6K time of 20:27.00 at the Paul Short Run leads the conference. She enters Saturday's meet the favorite to take home
another SEC title.
"She is running great," Fox noted. "This week will be a big test for
her. She has already beaten everyone she will race against earlier this
season at the Paul Short Run. The Tennessee girls will be her biggest
competition, especially Brooke Novak."
The women's team looks to improve on their sixth place finish at the
2003 meet. Homan will lead her group that will include veteran runners
Kylee Swanson and Dawn Morgan and several newcomers.
A much improved Tiger men's team was selected in the pre-season to
finish seventh in the conference, but have had much success and will
look to be a top-four finisher.
"We were ranked seventh in the pre-season, but I think we will be
fighting for a second, third or fourth place finish," Fox said. "The
guys think a lot of themselves and they proved it at the Paul Short meet
by defeating several top ranked teams. I think our men's team is one of
the top-25 teams in the country."
Junior Andrew Heath and newcomer Chris Walsh will lead the men. Heath
paced the Tigers at the Georgia State and Paul Short Run and Walsh led
the team at the Auburn meet. The men placed seventh at the 2003
championship.
For complete results from the SEC Championships please visit
http://www.hogwired.com and/or http://www.trackshark.com