Delaware club cross country made the short trip up to White Clay Creek State Park to host the Delaware Invitational. Along with the University of Delaware Women’s Cross Country team, the teams face the grueling course in a battle to defend their home turf.

The women started off the day with a third place finish in the 6k. Freshman Jade Barrett returned to competition, once again leading the team with a time of 26:37.83, placing 16th. The tandem of junior Jenna Mlecko (27:07.02) and freshman Kaitlyn Burke (27:21.59) took the final two podium spots for Delaware, both finishing in the top 20 overall. Freshman Hannah Heredia finished close behind them, finishing 23rd place in 27:35.9. Junior Natalie Pinto (28:28.54), freshman CJ Williams (28:35.32), and senior Madeleine Dorley (28:53.82) came in with back-to-back-to-back finishes to complete Delaware’s top seven. 

The men followed with a first place finish in the 8k. Senior Alex Horgan had complete control of the race, winning the whole meet with a time of 26:49.76. His time puts him above Mike Durkin for 5th place on the Delaware Club Cross Country leaderboard for the White Clay course. Freshman Alejandro Lobo (29:05.04) also cracked the top ten with a 10th place finish, followed closely by fellow freshman Evan Diefenbeck (29:15.62), who finished 11th. Rounding out the scoring five was junior Dan Giron (30:33.14) and senior Chris Calandra (30:41.01) in his first 8k of the season. Senior Sasha Latina followed with a time of 30:56.84, and freshman Brenden Debrosse cracked the top seven for the first time with a personal best 31:42.37.

Delaware’s sights now are pointed to NIRCA Regionals at Lehigh on October 29th, where they will try to qualify as a team for nationals.

Full results can be found here.