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The weather was great and the scenery was perfect as the Judges traveled to upstate New York this Saturday to compete at the Albany Invitational. Both squads were able to have some of their best performances of the season, as many runners earned personal records and high rankings at the meet. This successful meet comes after a number of lackluster performances by the Judges during the middle of their seasons.

The Mens team had a phenomenal finish this weekend as they were able to place fifth overall out of 26 teams at the competition. They were able to place ahead of eleven Division I squads and were the second best Division III team. The Women were similarly successful, as they came in third among Division III teams. They were also able to rank 16th overall out of a total of 29 teams present.

The Womens team was able to have an amazing showing on the five kilometer course with all of its scorers able to run below twenty minutes. The first Judge to cross the line was rookie Marie Lemay, who was able to finish the race with a time of 19 minutes and 23 seconds. This was good enough to earn her 74th place overall.

Ally Connolly 10 was the second Brandeis runner to cross the line with a time of 19 minutes and 30 seconds, which earned her 85th. Rookie Hannah Lindholm was right behind Connolly with a time of 19 minutes and 37 seconds to earn the Judges 94th overall. Sophomores Beth Pisarik and Julia Alpaio rounded out the Brandeis scorers. They were able to earn the squad 109th and 113th place respectively.

The Men similarly had a great race this weekend, finishing in the top of the pack, and ranking as the second best Division III team at the competition. For the third week in a row, the Judges were led by rookie Mekonen Gendobo, who was able to finish in 24th place. He ended with a time of just over 26 minutes on the eight kilometer course.

The next five Brandeis runners were close behind Gendobo, and all finished within sixteen seconds of each other. Matt Jennings 09 was the next Brandeis runner to cross the line, ending the race with a time of 26 minutes and 16 seconds;

good enough for 33rd place.

Several rookies on the squad were able to dominate the rest of scoring, as Dan Anastos, Paul Norton and Kerwin Vega were the next judges to complete the race. They were able to capture 43rd, 44th and 45th places, finishing just four seconds apart. This was a great showing for the Judges, as many runners had fallen into mid-season slumps in their recent meets.

Members of the mens team are optimistic about their chances at later competitions and excited about the recent performance.

The team definitely improved on their performance from the last few meets said rookie Zach Schwartz. All of our top guys are definitely running better.

Zach went on to comment about their ability to improve for the UAA Championships, which is just two weekends away.

With a few good workouts, he said, we will be ready for UAAs in a couple of weeks.

Runners on the womens side were equally happy with the recent competition.

The meet in Albany was solid, commented Co-Captain Katy Agule 09. It was a great day to race and everyone felt fresh and much better than the last meet at Franklin Park.

Agule also discussed the feeling that the team will do better at the upcoming championship meet.

It was a good tune-up before our UAA championships on the 27th, she said. I think we are all looking forward to going back to Franklin Park and running better than we have in the past.

The next competition for the cross country squads is the UAA championships hosted by Brandeis at Franklin Park during the last weekend of October.