The Portland State cross country teams begin their 2012 season this month at the John Frank Memorial Invitational, to be held in Corvallis, Oregon. The event will feature teams from PSU, Oregon State University, University of Oregon and University of Portland, among others.
The Portland State cross country teams begin their 2012 season this month at the John Frank Memorial Invitational, to be held in Corvallis, Oregon. The event will feature teams from PSU, Oregon State University, University of Oregon and University of Portland, among others.
The invitational is held in memory of John Frank, named California Runner of the Year in 1980 and ran cross country and track for Oregon State, where the tournament has been hosted since 2010.
The invitational will be the first real tournament of 2012 for most of the teams. It is a chance for them to see how they match up against their traditional rivals in Oregon.
The Vikings hope to repeat some of last season’s performances at the invitational. In 2011, PSU sophomore Zach Carpenter won the men’s individual 6,400-meter race, finishing in a fraction over 20 minutes and 18 seconds.
In the same race, Vikings freshman Jake Schwartz finished fifth with a time of 21:34, while sophomore Cary Dunagan finished sixth, two seconds behind Schwarz.
Some of the other teams who participated in the men’s race included the Corvallis Running Club and the University of Oregon Running Club. However, there were no team results since some of these teams were not attached to a university athletics department.
The women’s team finished third, behind OSU and University of Portland, in the 2011 tournament. Vikings junior Amber Rozcicha was second in the women’s 4,500-meter race, out of 33 runners. She finished with a time of 16:7. No other member of the PSU team finished in the top 10.
In 2010, the men’s team finished third out of three teams, after Oregon and University of Portland, while the women’s team finished fourth after Oregon, University of Portland and Oregon State.
This year, PSU’s top returner is Carpenter, who had two wins last season. He was also named the Big Sky Cross Country Athlete of the Week in September 2011. Some of the other returning players are Dunagan and sophomore Josue Rodriguez. On the women’s side, Rozcicha and junior Brittany Castillo will be the top returners.
After the John Frank Memorial Invitational, the Vikings will have just two months before they participate in the 2012 Big Sky Conference Championship.
