The UW-Eau Claire men’s and women’s cross country teams finished out their regular seasons Friday afternoon at the Lake Wissota Tri-meet in Eau Claire.

Because the Blugolds held back their top 12 runners in the meet, the “B” squad finished out its season in the competition.

“We are running 12 men and women at the conference meet next weekend,” coach Brian Falk said. “I did chose to hold them out of competition this week because at this time of year, I think they benefit with a week off.”

Women
UW- La Crosse came out on top in team scoring with 15 points. UW-Stout finished in second place with 57 points and the Blugolds came in last with 69 points.

Junior Claudia Borlee was the top women’s finisher with a time of 20 minutes 24 seconds. Following Borlee was sophomore Laura Napier and freshman Julia Gieschen.

Junior Molly Warner said the runners who did compete came out looking strong in their final race of the season.

“(The people that did race) seemed very happy with their times,” she said.

Warner said the rest of the women’s team expects to come out strong next weekend during the conference meet.

“We’re hoping to come in the top three,” she said. “We’ve been running faster workout times to get stronger.”

Men
For the men’s meet, only Stout’s team competed against Eau Claire for the meet. The Blue Devils came out on top with 19 team points over the Blugolds’ 39 points.

The men’s team was led by sophomore Andy Warren, who finished in third place overall with a time of 16:49. Finishing in second and third place on the team were freshman John Rainey and sophomore Wes Fischer, respectively.

Senior Ted Lillie said the team was able to finish out its season well, despite not having its top 12 runners in contention.

“Our guys were running against Stout’s entire team and they actually fared pretty well,” he said.

Lillie said the Blugolds’ biggest and toughest workouts took place last week.

“We all know (the WIAC conference meet) is going to be an extremely competitive race,” he said.

The conference meet will be held on Saturday at La Crosse.

Falk said he expects the teams to keep a relaxed frame of mind in place and not let too much thought affect the meet’s outcome.

“We really just have to go on with business as usual,” he said. “We’ve been racing well week in and week out and we want to just keep doing that.”