The University of Arizona competed in their first Big 12 Championship and came out to be unceremonious in both races. The men’s team finished their 8k in the bottom half of the leaderboard coming in 9th as a team and the woman’s 6k had the Wildcats placed 16th out of 16 teams.

The race took place in Waco, Texas on Nov. 1 with the Men’s 8k taking place at 8 a.m. The men’s 8k had a few top 100 finishers and finished 9th out of 13 teams. 

Gideon Mengich, a freshman from Kenya, finished 35th among individual racers with a time of 23:31.61. This is yet another personal best for him after just recently shattering his previous best at the Highlander Invitational on Oct. 19. This is, however, the first time he has not finished first in a race this season.

Michael Urbanski and Ian Sanchez Lopez placed in 52nd and 55th respectively with times of 24:05.69 and 24:09.79. Although faster than their times in the Highlander Invitational, the team altogether struggled to find themselves close to the conference’s nationally ranked teams.

The Wildcat’s 280 point total is a sizable 46 points below 8th place finishers, University of Cincinnati.

The women’s team had no finishers in the top 100 and finished last behind all other the participating teams. The top finisher for the Wildcats, Brooklyn Hanania, finished just outside at 102nd followed by teammate Laina Friedmann at 105th. Their times were 22:38.84 and 22:44.24 respectively   

A gap of 72 points was between Arizona and the 15th place finishers University of Houston.

Next up

Both teams will await their fates and see if they are selected for the NCAA Western Regional Championships happening on Friday, Nov. 15 in Colfax, Washington.

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