Clayton State cross country teams gear up for
Peach Belt Conference Championships
Laker women favorites to win first-ever Peach Belt title

MORROW, Ga. — October 18, 2006 — The Clayton State Laker men’s and women’s cross country squads are ready for the Peach Belt Conference Championships for this Saturday in Smiths Station, Ala. The Laker women may be the pre-race favorites to overtake defending champion and meet host Columbus State University, while the reverse is likely to happen as Columbus State is favored to unseat the Clayton State men who are the defending champs.

“Our women’s team has had a great season to this point,” said Laker head coach Mike Mead. “We’re one of the frontrunners for the women’s title, but we still have to contend with Columbus State and Augusta State is pretty close too. We have a chance to make history with our first Peach Belt title.”

The Laker women have finished third in the Peach Belt the last four seasons and have finished runner-up in 1996 and 2001. The team has been led by a strong one-two combination of junior two-time All-American Allison Kreutzer and senior transfer Angela Cobb. In four of five competitions this season, the duo has finished first and second to lead the Clayton State women to three second-place team finishes this season.

“Allison and Angela have been a deadly duo this season and are perhaps the strongest NCAA Division II runners in the South,” said Mead. “They have the fastest times run this season (17:44 and 17:47, respectively, for 5K) in the Peach Belt, but they may get challenged by Columbus State’s Isabel Speer who is the top returning finisher from the 2005 Peach Belt meet.”

Kreutzer and Cobb have solid support this season in senior Cassandra Bolivar (19:45), junior transfer Terrica Hamilton (20:23), junior Katelyn Stache (20:46), and freshmen Maria Larsen (20:55), Isabelle Ahanotu and Titisha Cochran. The Lakers will be at full strength with the return of senior Melissa Fernandez who has been coming back from a summer training injury.

The Laker men have had their struggles this year and will be running short-handed on Saturday.

“We focused on bringing in high school guys, so we are a very young team,” said Mead.

The Lakers have been led this season by junior college transfer Nelson Lopez. He has been supported by freshmen Chris Ritchie, Travis Morris and David Taylor. Meanwhile, the lone returnee from last season, Peter Gajda, will miss this year’s meet due to an injury. Filling in for Gajda will be sophomore Alfred Dixon from the Laker track team.

The conference meet will award the Top 14 women’s finishers and the Top 8 men’s finishers with All-PBC honors. A total of 13 Clayton State women have garnered All-PBC honors 21 times while 11 men have garnered all-conference honors 15 times. The men’s 8K race will begin at 9 a.m., followed with the women’s 5K race at 9:45 a.m.