The Tripod

In their last meet of the regular season, the women's cross country team placed ninth out of 24 teams at the Saratoga Invitational in upstate New York.

Senior captain Allie Lemire paced the Bantams with a 12th place finish, and earned a pumpkin pie reward from the race officials, much to the happiness of her roommates and friends. She has clearly established herself as the leader of the team going into the postseason and looks to have a serious chance at earning All-New England honors. "I'm really happy with the way my season is going. It's the best cross country season I've ever had," she said.

For the majority of her career, Lemire has excelled and specialized on the track in the middle distance races, but this season she has established herself as a top-tier cross country distance runner. "I am happy with my personal records, but I still need to perform well in the championship meets at the end of the season." She will begin that quest next weekend at the NESCAC Championships in Maine.

The freshmen duo of Reagan Aylmer and Katlin Mock were the second and third Bantam runners, finishing in 37th and 47th place. Throughout this season, those two have stepped up to fill in some of space behind Lemire and have typically been the second and third Trinity runners. With a team that is primarily comprised of freshman, they have shown that a team or runner does not necessarily need experience to yield strong results. "We're doing very well for having such a young team and all the freshman are building up a good base to have great careers at Trinity," said Lemire. Even if the team is not able to perform up to their aspirations in the upcoming postseason, everyone can be confident that the squad is undoubtedly destined to be strong for years to come.

Junior captain Kate Barton was the fourth Trinity runner, coming in at 64th place overall. She was followed by Dana Pollock '12, who was the fifth and final Trinity runner to score. Pollock crossed the line in 141st place, which gave the team an aggregate score of 261 points, only one ahead of 10th place of host school, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Giselle Harrington '10, the third of the three upperclassman and captains on the team, has been struggling the past few weeks with a knee injury. She has been alternating her training between running and work on the elliptical machine in an effort to reduce some of the stress and impact on her knee. Last year and before her injury this year, she has been a regular in the top five and team expects her to be on starting line next week. Her return should provide a boost to the team and provide some stability to the top five.

After the NESCAC Championships, the team will run at the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) meet. This meet will most likely serve as a last opportunity for those not in the top seven to run, as only seven runners are allowed to compete per team at the New England Division III Championships. That meet will be hosted by Williams College on Saturday, Nov. 15. If any of the women are able to qualify, the National Championships will be held on Saturday, Nov. 22, in Hanover, Ind.

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