Women’s cross country finished fourth of 22 in the Division III Pre-National Meet last Friday in Colfax, Wisc. The Scots beat all other MIAC teams at the six-kilometer meet, which was made more challenging by 39-degree temperatures and 20-mph gusts of rain-laced wind.

According to Coach Jordan Cushing, a whopping 21 members of the team posted personal record (PR) times despite the race’s adverse climate conditions.

“I think the most impressive accomplishment about the Mac women right now is that they are consistently racing at a higher level,” Cushing said.

Macalester finished behind three nationally ranked teams and only 25 points behind 19th-ranked Emory, who finished third. The team defeated last year’s MIAC champion Gustavus Adolphus by 113 points. “[The Scots stayed] focused and [got] out aggressive,” Cushing said. “This team wants it.”

Macalester’s top five runners finished within 50 seconds of one another, posting a low score of 126 points. The result placed Mac comfortably ahead of conference rivals St. Olaf and 23rd-ranked St. Thomas who accumulated 194 points and 211 points respectively.

As they did two weeks ago, Koby Hagen ’06 and Francie Streich ’06 led the way for the Scots. Hagen, last year’s MIAC individual conference champion, placed eighth overall and third among MIAC runners with a time of 23:00.

Completing the race 13 seconds after Hagen, Streich finished 15th and beat her PR time by 55 seconds.

Alli Woerpel ’07 was 26th overall, running a PR of 23:30, almost a minute faster than her previous best time.

Anna Shamey ’07 and co-captain Anna Gordon ’06 were the Scots’ fourth and fifth finishers, coming in 38th and 39th overall, respectively.