THIBODAUX, La. – The Nicholls State University men's and women's cross country squads are set to race at the Southland Conference Championships Friday morning, which will be held at the Abilene Christian University cross country course. The women's 6K is set to begin at 8:30 a.m. with the men's 8K featuring a 9:30 a.m. start.
"I'm excited to see how well our women compete over the 6000m distance," head coach
Stefanie Slekis said. "All season we've run longer workouts to prepare for this distance so the team is looking forward to their hard work paying off. Our men's team is eager to improve over 8000m after getting to race that distance at our last meet. Both teams are prepared to improve on Nicholls' team scores from last year. Everyone is ready to race a personal best and hopefully that puts us in position to surprise some of our opponents in the team race."
Freshmen duo
Trey Lowery and
John Paul Spera have spearheaded the men's pack this season. Although Spera was the top Nicholls men's finisher at the first three meets, Lowery picked up the pace at the Mississippi College Invitational as the first Colonel to cross the finish line. Lowery (30:00.1) and Spera (30:24.1) placed 32nd and 33rd, respectively, in that event.
Senior
Hannah Naquin has fronted the women's squad in all four meets. The Folsom native was the Colonels top finisher at the past two SLC Championships and hopes to best her previous 6K PR mark of 24:24.7.
This meet will mark the 6K debut for the remainder of the women's team. Freshman
Eleana Callejas has the only other sub-21 5K time, running a personal-best 20:41.3 at the McNeese Cowboy Stampede, which was more than two minutes faster than her first collegiate race.
To stay up to date with the Nicholls cross country squads, follow the teams on twitter
@Nicholls_XCTF.
