Sept. 8, 2009
College Station - The only Aggie home meet of the fall cross country season takes place on Saturday, Sept. 12, as the annual Texas A&M Invitational will be contested on the Penberthy Intramural Fields starting at 7:45 a.m.
Admission to the course is free. In addition to the races, there will a fan zone along with a concession stand. Parking for the event is available in the Reed Arena lots across the street for the start/finish area on the Penberthy Intramural Field.
More members of the A&M men's South Central Region title team from last season open their 2009 season this weekend as Mitch Bible and Joe Sauvageau lead the Aggies over the men's 8,000-meter course. On the women's side Christina Munoz will pace the A&M women over a course covering 5,000 meters. Race time for the university men is 7:45 a.m. while the university women start at 8:30 a.m.
The Aggie men will be defending a six-year run as team champion of the Texas A&M Invitational. Last season A&M totaled 22 points to claim first place over a field of 13 scoring teams. Bible and Sauvageau finished third and fourth a year ago while Kevin Burnett placed 12th. Munoz, meanwhile, finished seventh last season in the women's field as the A&M team placed fifth.
A field of 2,400 runners will contest the various race divisions on the Aggie home course. Texas A&M will host 20 men's teams and 19 women's squads in the collegiate division.
Teams in the university division include Baylor, Houston, Houston Baptist, LSU, Lubbock Christian (men), Monterrey Tech (men), Prairie View A&M, Rice (women), Sam Houston State, SMU (women), Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, Texas State, UT-Pan American, UT-San Antonio and Wayland Baptist.
Members of the A&M men's team competing at the Texas A&M Invitational include: Chad Brown, Wes Caceras, Raul Cetina, Stephen Curry, Micah Dettmer, Andrew Montes, Graham Northcutt, MacLean O'Donnell, Matt Ross, Ryan Snapp, George Stredny and Jimmy Welin.
The Aggie women's crew of runners will include: Sarah Balfour, Kirsten Brown, Itzel Cetina, Lexi Crommett, Shawn Dalglish, Katherine Devlin, Emilie Fischer, Amanda Jenkins, Amber Weems and Catherine Wright.
On the high school level, in which seeded races begin at 9 a.m. (boys) and 9:35 a.m. (girls), there are 66 boy's squads and 65 girl's teams entered. In the high school division there will be a seeded race, then a 5A/4A division, followed by a 3A/2A/1A division and then junior varsity races.
In the boys high school division at the Texas A&M Invitational pre-season rankings from Dyestat.com include No. 3 Klein Oak as the highest-ranked squad among schools in the South Region. FEAST Home School of San Antonio is ranked No. 8 in the region while Brenham and Georgetown have received votes for the top 10.
On the women's side No. 2 Kingwood tops the field of South Region teams with No. 4 Cedar Park Vista Ridge and No. 7 Belton also entered. Other squads entered in the A&M Invitational and receiving votes in the region include A&M Consolidated, Keller, Magnolia West, and Round Rock McNeil.