Strong finishes by the Cyclone men put them second only to Colorado at the Big 12 Conference Championships.

The ISU women runners finished eighth in the conference, yet saw some stand-out performances by individuals on the team.

Coach Kevin Bourke said Colorado is such a strong team it would have been difficult to beat them even with an exceptional Cyclone showing. Still, Bourke said he was glad to take second.

Cyclones Saul Lempirikany and David Lichoro crossed the line in third and fourth place overall with times of 24:17 and 24:29.

Lempirikany, who championed the Iowa State Memorial Classic two weeks ago, said, “I felt good today, and I am very happy for the team to take home a second-place finish against Big 12 competition.”

Bourke said Lempirikany and Lichoro ran solid races.

He also said it was good to see Kevin Farrow complete the race despite a side pain that nearly took him out at the halfway point. Farrow clocked a 25:32 to place 19th in the 95-man race.

Bourke said he was very happy with runners Samuel Magu (25:27) and Tait Steines (26:14) who finished third and fifth for the Cyclones.

Magu passed seven runners in the last portion of the 8K to help ISU steal the second place slot from Oklahoma State.

Tait Steines was the fifth man in for the team who also played an important role in the team’s placing.

Steines said he and his teammates knew they were only as strong as their fifth man and someone would have to step up. Steines pushed himself to compete at a pace fast enough to fill the open fifth-man position.

He said he felt good about the run.

“I felt better this race than I did other ones. That, and I knew that I had to run good,” Steines said.

“Without [Steines’] performance, we wouldn’t have finished as high as we did,” Bourke said.

The women’s team did not compete as well as they hoped due to health problems and an unexpected injury. The Cyclone runners picked up eighth place in the Big 12 Conference meet.

Although feeling under the weather, Amber Garrett still managed to finish first for ISU, placing 28th among 93 conference competitors.

Cyclone Erin Bresnan chased Garrett into the chutes to snag 29th. The two registered 18:46 and 18:48, respectively, for the 5K run.

Coach Dick Lee said he was surprised Garrett was able to finish considering she could not breathe.

“I was pleased with the way she gutted out her performance,” Lee said.

He said Bresnan, Mickey Skidmore and Gayle Nugent had their best races of the season and Stacey Armstrong also ran a consistent race.

Bresnan, who was fairly happy with her personal performance, said the team was not as thrilled with the outcome.

“I feel that we’re a better team than we ran,” she said. “I think we had really hoped to do a little better, but we had a couple of people who had really good races.”

Skidmore said they were a little disappointed, but she said the runners decided it went fairly well considering their illnesses and injuries.

“I think everybody ran really well for how they were feeling,” she said.

Lee also was disappointed with the meet and those events which kept the team from racing as well as it could.

Like Garrett, Laurie Meythaler suffered from poor health during the race and Jen Crapisi sprained her ankle early in the race.

Lee said the team can’t change what happened Saturday, but the women are looking to regain their health and prepare for regionals which are two weeks away.

The Cyclone men and women will run regionals on their home course on Nov. 15. The meet will determine which teams and runners will make their second trip of the season to South Carolina, the site of the NCAA championship competition scheduled for Nov. 24.