Men Place Third, Women Fourth at Mt. SAC Invitational

WALNUT, Calif. --- El Camino College competed at the Mount San Antonio College Invitational on Friday in the final race of the season before the conference championships and 3C2A postseason.

The Warriors' men posted an excellent showing, making the podium in third place overall with 98 points in a field of 13 full teams and eight other incomplete teams.

The host Mounties placed first with 25 points and Hartnell placed second with 64 points.

Alan Canales and Aaron Cohen paced the Warriors as the duo placed 11th (21:47.2) and 12th (21:52.3) respectively. Freshman Angel Yanez also finished inside the top-20 with a 19th-place showing and a time of 22:04.4 in a field consisting of 150 total runners.

Canales improved his time by an astonishing 27 seconds from his time in the same event last season while Cohen improved his time by four seconds.

The rest of the Warriors squad finished in the following order: Ty McCormick (34th, 22:48.7), Bradley Barbosa (39th, 22:54.2), Aiden Nakai (52nd, 23:23.6), Juan Avellana (58th, 23:37.9), and Gavin Borges (74th, 24:23.6).

On the women's side, the Warriors just missed the podium with a fourth-place finish, posting 107 points. They finished behind Mt. SAC (1st, 29), Hartnell (2nd, 62) and East Los Angeles (3rd, 88).

Elaine Dugmore finished in 14th place to lead the Warriors, posting a time of 21:13.0. She improved on her time at the same event last year by 4:03 to lead the team this season. Freshman Ayla Barbosa finished in 20th place with a time of 21:33.1 and Arianna Hurtado was 23rd with a time of 21:39.4. Emily Gutierrez (29th, 22:23.4) and Denise Delgado (54th, 24:54.7) rounded out the team scoring.

The Warriors will now head to the South Coast Conference championships on Friday at Heartwell Park in Long Beach, Calif. The Warriors' men finished first and the women placed second at the SCC Preview on the same course in the first race of the season on Aug. 30.