Blazers Finish 16th at the Arkansas Chile Pepper Invitational

Amanda Kara

The UAB cross country team placed 16th out of a 37-team field at the Chile Pepper Cross Country Invitational at Agri Park Saturday. UAB finished with 469 points. The 6,000-meter race was the longest of the season for the Blazers.

Senior Amanda Kara was the top finisher for the Blazers as she ran a personal best for a 6K (22:23.86) and placed 52nd out of 285 runners. Freshman Emry McKay took 65th for UAB with a time of 22:38.64.

"This is the biggest race we've run in so far this season," said UAB head coach Ray Stanfield. "We beat some good programs today. We are a young team and no one had run this distance so far this season. This is the toughest meet we've run in this season. I thought Amanda ran well today.

"We will come back and hopefully have some good training sessions and get rest and look for a strong finish at the Conference Championships."

The perennial champions, Arkansas, ranked 19th in the FinishLynx/NCAA Division I Women's Cross Country Poll, were upset by the University of Nevada who tallied 114 points to take the team title. Texas Tech finished in second with 122, Arkansas took third at 153, Virginia Tech was fourth with 155 and Vanderbilt rounded out the top five with 160.

The Blazers finished ahead of LSU and Ole Miss of the Southeastern Conference, Kansas State of the Big 12 and Memphis of Conference USA.

UAB next competes in the Conference USA championships Nov. 1 in Tampa, Fla.