Led by a third-place finish from Keri Lambert ’13, the women’s cross-country team took fourth place at the NCAA New England Regionals held Saturday at Bowdoin, earning an at-large bid to the National Championships in the process.
On the men’s side, Andrew Erskine ’13 individually qualified for the Championships in finishing sixth, while the team had a strong eighth-place showing.
The cross country teams showed their depth over the weekend, with the women’s and men’s teams both finishing in the top 10 at the ECAC Championships on Saturday, without their respective top runners. The women took fifth, while the men ended up sixth.
The Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) is made up of 312 member schools, including 182 Div. III schools.
Forty women’s teams and 44 men’s teams participated in Saturday’s race at Williams, giving the Lord Jeffs plenty of competition.
Keri Lambert ’13 took an early lead in Saturday’s NESCAC Championship and finished second overall, helping propel the women to third place. On the men’s side, a balanced effort led to an eighth-place finish on the team’s home course.
Junior Keri Lambert won her first collegiate meet on Saturday at Williams’ Purple Valley Classic, leading the women to a strong fourth-place finish, while the men’s team placed sixth, both out of fields of 16 teams.
Lambert “dominated a field of 202 runners, many of whom compete for some of the top Div. III programs in the country,” said coach John Adamson. She finished the 6k is 22:00 minutes — 26 seconds ahead of the closest runner. Averaging 5:54 per mile, Lambert was the only woman to post an average mile time under six minutes.
The cross country teams opened their seasons with a good showing at the UMass Invitational this weekend, despite racing with only half of their full force. The women’s team placed third overall while the men’s team finished sixth.
Women
The women’s cross country team will have four of last year’s top five runners, which promises great success for the program. Last year, the women’s team qualified for the NCAA meet by placing third behind Middlebury and Williams at the NCAA District Championship meet. The team’s eighth place NCAA finish was the program’s best result since it won the division title in 2007, and the third top-10 finish in the last five years.
