Sept. 13, 2009

The rain might have had other plans for the Texas A&M Cross Country Invitational slated for this past Saturday (Sept. 12), but somebody forgot to tell UTPA's cross country coach Dave Hartman. The rain that fell the night before made for unsafe running conditions for the course set up, and TAMU decided to cancel the meet.

Hartman who had previous coached at TAMU, was very familiar with areas surrounding College Station. Hartman with the help of a few other coaches quickly scouted the area set up an area to hold the meet. After all, five other schools including UTPA made the trek and they weren't to be denied.

What was dubbed the Brazos Valley Open took place Saturday morning pitting the five schools men & women's cross country teams against each other.

On the men's side, UTPA tallied 114 points placing them fourth. Gilroy Martinez finished with a time of 22:26 placing him 12th out of 34 runners.

"Gilroy had a great race and showed tremendous senior leadership," said Hartman

In her first event as a Lady Bronc, Judith Chumba finished with a time of 19:37 in the 5K placing her 14th to lead the Lady Broncs.

"In her debut for UTPA,Judith ran an intelligent race moving up very well through the pack as the race progressed," Hartman added.

"Overall, I was satisfied with our performances today. We only have a week of practice under our belt and this meet will help us get where we need to be. We have a lot of work to do however we will be a much improved team as the weeks go by," said Hartman

The men and women's cross country program will be back in action as they travel to Corpus Christi, Texas for the Texas A&M-Corpus Christi Islander Splash on Sept. 25.