Facing some of their toughest competition this season, the Florida women’s cross country team needed their best performances if they hoped to compete with some of the top runners in North America.
They’ll have to be content with being the best Southeastern Conference team to race on Saturday at the Paul Short Run, besting Alabama and Mississippi State on the way to 268 points and an eighth-place finish.
With Guelph University of Canada turning in an absolutely dominant performance, finishing with just 48 points and all six racers finishing in the top 50, the Gators had to settle for a slew of personal-bests from their runners rather than competing for the title.
In just her third collegiate race, freshman Lauren Brasure led the Gators for the second straight time, as she finished the Women’s Gold 6k in 16th with a time of 20:27.
It was another strong finish for the budding leader from Ada, Michigan. After winning the Mountain Dew Invitational on Sept. 20, Brasure made sure to show her victory was a sign of emerging leadership rather than a fluke performance.
The team also made sure that Brasure’s energetic performance wasn’t all for naught. The youth movement continued with sophomore Taylor Tubbs finishing 10 seconds later, good for 21st place. Redshirt freshman Becky Greene and redshirt junior Grace VanDeGrift solidified a positive Florida finish by placing 36th and 66th, respectively.
With all competing Gators, minus redshirt junior Macy Huskey, setting personal bests in the 6k, coach Paul Spangler chose to focus on the accomplishments of his runners rather than harp on the difficulties that several faced.
“I thought Lauren [Brasure] and Taylor [Tubbs] did a great job up front for us,” Spangler said, in a press release. “They both hit lifetime personal bests.”
Huskey finished her race in 22 minutes flat, good for 129th place. Sophomore Amber Johnson rounded out the Gators’ rotation three seconds later, coming in 134th.
Boasting several of the top cross country programs in the country, the Paul Short Run featured 38 teams and 329 runners who traveled from all over the country to showcase their talent and potential.
From an observational standpoint, the Gators were able to leave Bethlehem, Pa. with a better understanding of where the team stands if they hope to compete at the Wisconsin adidas Invitational on Oct. 17.
Brasure finished nearly 40 seconds off the time that Florida State senior Colleen Quigley turned in, as she won the Women’s Gold 6k in 19:49. The decorated Seminole turned in the third-fastest time in the course’s history, behind course record-holder Marie-Louise Asselin of West Virginia who finished with a time of 19:38 in 2008, and Darmouth’s Abbey D’Agostino, who finished in 19:44 last year on her way to an NCAA individual title.
While Brasure’s time doesn’t place her in elite company, it’s another sign of improvement for the runner in what has already been a solid start to the season.
The next step in cementing the Gators as an NCAA contender is to shore up the roster depth. Spangler has preached to the team all season about the importance in receiving support from its fourth and fifth runners.
“We had some things go our way today we had some things not go our way,” Spangler said, in a press release. “I thought it was a good thing for us to come here and run a 6k.”
“We had a couple runners who just had an off day today. Now we have a couple of weeks here to get back to work.”
Follow Graham Hall on Twitter @Graham311
Becky Greene races during the 2014 Mountain Dew Invitational on UF's Mark Bostick Golf Course.
