Cross Country: Concordia men run to 2nd-place finish

Vancouver, Wash. — Dana Schmidt and Zach Meineke earned All-America honors to pace Concordia University to a second-place finish in the men’s race at the NAIA cross country championships on Saturday.

It was the sixth time in program history that the Concordia cross country-track team was the national runner-up as the Bulldogs finished second with 166 points, trailing Malone University’s 44 points. Doane College came in 28th.

In the women’s race, Concordia was 20th.

Schmidt finished in seventh overall with a time of 25:25, and Meineke was eighth at 25:26. David Goeglein finished in 33rd (26:00), Luka Thor was 50th (26:15), Tyson Billings was 68th (26:26), Jon Grotefendt was 72nd (26:28) and Colin Morrissey was 75th (26:31) for the Concordia men.

“Our guys ran very well today,” Bulldogs coach Kregg Einspahr said. “Dana and Zach had tremendous races to finish as All-Americans. Luka Thor running fourth was big for us today.

“Malone University has a great squad. I’m just very proud of our guys. ... They really performed well.”

Sufian Kimo led the Tigers with his 24-place finish in 25:47 and Edwin Ronoh ran a 26:30, good for 73rd. Kipp Schuler finished in 119th place (26:40) and Andrew Palmblade finished 220th (27:35) competing individually for Dana College.

The Concordia women finished with a team score of 459. It’s the 16th straight year that the Bulldog women have finished in the top 20 nationally. Doane had two individual qualifiers as Viviana Arreola finished 84th and Yadira Salazar was 238th.

Concordia’s Jena Schwalenberg finished 36th with a time of 19:20, Ann Hershberger was 91st at 20:05 and Dana Kluthe was 100th at 20:11. Other finishers for the Bulldogs included Rebecca Mol in 115th (20:25), Alicia Marteney in 117th (20:26), Emilie Bourret in 138th (20:39) and Hannah Ferry in 181st (21:28).

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