Official Results
EAST RIDGE, Tenn. – Maryville broke its best team average time record by 27 seconds Friday to highlight the group's performance at the UTC Home Meet.
Maryville runners averaged 29 minutes and 30 seconds over the 8K course at Camp Jordan in the Chattanooga suburbs. That easily surpassed the 29:57 record average Maryville set back in 2013.
The Scots also saw all seven runners set PRs, led by
Steve Cope and
Tyler Tangel. Cope crossed the finish line in 16th place at 28:01.5, with Tangel close behind in 19th place at 28:10.9. Those times landed Cope fifth on the MC 8K Top Performers chart and Tangel sixth.
"I am very proud of our athletes today," Maryville head coach
Kaitlyn Carringer-Adams said. "For the last two weeks, I have been telling my athletes that our goal for this race was to use the fast competition and flat course to help push themselves to a PR, and that's exactly what every runner did.
"Every single team member ran a PR by at least 40 seconds or more – some by almost 3 minutes. Most athletes do not PR by minutes, and it's even more rare for an entire team to do so. Today was another great testament of how hard work has paid off for this group."
More PRs for Maryville
James LeNeve was the next finisher for Maryville in 27th place at 29:26.7, followed closely by
Terry Gonzalez in 29th place at 30:29.6 and
Gustavo Hernandez in 30th place at 31:22.6. Just missing the score line were
Paul Kanios in 31st place at 31:24.2 and
Wyatt Crider in 33rd place at 32:53.1. All those times were PRs.
Maryville totaled 121 points to finish in fourth place out of six teams. The host Mocs posted a perfect score of 15 after placing the top five finishers within 24 seconds of one another.
Carringer-Adams likes how her team is progressing ahead of the Collegiate Conference of the South Championships, set for Nov. 1 in Clinton, Mississippi.
"Today was a great confidence boost," Carringer-Adams said. "Now we just need to carry that momentum over to the conference championships."
