VERMONT INVITE
ST. ALBANS, Vt. – Andrew Crompton raced to a second-place finish to headline Vermont cross country in its season-opening meet on Saturday afternoon at Hard'Ack Recreation Area. Crompton and the UVM men finished third in the team competition with a score of 56 points. The Vermont women finished fifth with 100 points.
 
RELATED LINKS
Results: Women's 5k | Men's 8k
CatamounTV Highlights
Photos
 
COACH'S QUOTE
"Overall, it was a good opportunity to shake some rust off from a racing standpoint," head coach Matt Belfield said. The course was challenging today with the heat as well. It certainly provided for some evaluation of the teams after a hectic start to the semester. Joe Gingras and I thought our men raced pretty well as a team, and definitely see some potential for improvements, particularly with our rookies. Andrew was strong and I though James had a great first collegiate 8k. Dillon is poised to a make a contribution in XC after a solid summer of preparation. Our women had some bright spots too, depsite the disappointing team result. We'll have to be patient with our training and when we put the whole team back together, we will be much stronger for sure. I thought Saide ran exceptionally well today and, both Clare Kelly as the frontrunner and newcomer Claire MacDonald were impressive too. There are a lot of new women on the team and I see so many striving to make a contribution. Our sophomore class has taken a big step forward off the summer training as well. We're confident that the upcoming training cycle can create some consistency and will yeald results come later in October."
 
HOW IT HAPPENED

• Crompton's second-place finish came with a time of 25:31.90 to lead the Catamounts. Derby, Vt. native James Cilwik placed 12th in his first collegiate race with a time of 26:17.50.
• Dillon Jensen scored 12 points for Vermont with a time of 26:30.10 and a 24th-place finish. Nathan Stine (26:33.90) and Steven O'Driscoll (26:44.10) rounded out the scorers for the UVM men.
• Clare Kelly led the Vermont women with a time of 19:10.40 that placed her 13th  overall. Sadie Holmes (19:23.80) and Hope Tyska (19:29.70) picked up 19 points and 21 points, respectively, for the Catamounts.
• Veronica Bassett (19:42.70) and rookie Claire MacDonald (19:43.00) rounded out UVM's scorers in the season-opener.

UP NEXT
The Vermont women return to action on Saturday (Sept. 10) for the Maribel Sanchez Souther Invitational at Dartmouth. The meet kicks off at 10:30 a.m. in Hanover, N.H. The UVM men will be back in action on Sept. 23.