Carolina Cross Country Heads to Rock Hill for Winthrop Invitational

COLUMBIA– The South Carolina women’s cross country squad returns to the course at 10 a.m. on Saturday for its second meet of the season. The Gamecocks make a second in-state trip. This week they head to Rock Hill for the Winthrop Invitational. It will be Carolina’s second consecutive meet at 5K this season. The Gamecocks will bump the distance up to 6K starting on Oct. 1 at the Paul Short Run.

Hannah Twine (second) and Lily Weeks (third) led the way for Carolina in their first meet, which it won as a team. The Gamecocks put five in the top nine in Spartanburg to take home the team title. Twine, Weeks, Kira Jenkins, Claudia Satzke and Syrah Ghijselings all finished in the top nine to score 28 points for the Gamecocks.

Follow the Meet
Fans can follow along with updates on Twitter @GamecockTrack. A full recap will be posted on Twitter, Facebook and GamecocksOnline.com.

Meet Schedule
The women’s 5K race is scheduled to kick off at 10 a.m. from Winthrop’s cross country course near the Winthrop Coliseum in Rock Hill.

Last Time Out
The Gamecocks opened their season with a team victory at the Eye Opener at USC Upstate. Hannah Twine and Lilly Weeks led the way for the Gamecocks, finishing in second and third, respectively. Twine and Weeks led five Gamecocks across the line within the top nine athletes. Kira Jenkins finished sixth, Claudia Satzke took eighth and Syrah Ghijselings placed ninth to round out the scoring for Carolina. All of Carolina’s athletes finished in the top 50 in a field of over 100 runners in Spartanburg. Katerina Hendrix and Savannah Bowers were sixth and seventh across for the Gamecocks. They took 11th and 14th, respectively.

Gamecock Entries in Rock Hill
Racing for Carolina: Kathleen Abrams, Savannah Bowers, Hannah Cella, Christina Ceniccola, Elizabeth Davison, Lyndsey Fowler, Syrah Ghijselings, Kensi Gray, Katerina Hendrix, Kira Jenkins, Meg Lebo, Jenna Pellizzari, Emily Pierontoni, Isabella Pisani, Briana Reckling, Claudia Satzke, Hannah Twine.

Coach Allden on the Meet
On his thoughts ahead of the Winthrop Invitational
“We are trying to gradually increase our intensity over the course of the season. This is another step in that direction. This is a good opportunity for us to compete for a team and individual title. The competition will be a little more stiff than our last meet. The Winthrop course is nice and it’s a good course. I think it’s one of the best courses in the state. Success will probably look more like five girls in the top 15 or 20 as compared to five in the top 10.”

On Hannah Twine’s return
“She’s returning to competition after a significant break. She’s made strides in practice every week. I was thrilled to death with the performance of Lily Weeks, who is a freshman. I look forward to us competing the way we did a couple of weeks ago, which would be to get into the mix and going after it. I think we’ll have a good result if we can do that again.”

On the style of running to put five athletes in the top nine at the Eye Opener
“We had a lot of movement over the course of the race in terms of who our No. 2 was and who our No. 5 was throughout the race. I think the result is more indicative of the tight range we have between not only No. 1 through No. 6, but also our spread between No. 3 and No. 7. There were times we had people pairing up, which I always encourage, but our plan wasn’t to get these five people all together and do this at this point and so on. We have a lot of young people and I want to see what they can do. We’ve also got a lot of people coming back at a higher level than they did the previous year, so it’s feeling out where they are.”