CCAA Cross-Country Running National Championships

St. Clair Set to Host CCAA Cross-Country Running National Championships

St. Clair College is set to host the Canadian Collegiate Athletic Association Cross-Country Running National Championships at Windsor’s Malden Park on November 9th. This will be the second time the Saints have presented the event to collegiate teams from across Canada which was held at the same site in 2003 and was the second cross-country championship in the CCAA’s history.

Thirty-eight schools across four conferences have qualified teams or individuals to participate in the event with the Women’s race starting at 12:00pm followed by the Men’s Race at 1:00pm. The Women’s field features 98 runners including 15 teams while the Men will send out 100 competitors and 16 teams.

The Ontario Colleges Athletic Association (OCAA) will have six schools in each gender including Men’s and Women’s teams from host St. Clair College, Fanshawe College (London), Mohawk College (Hamilton) and Humber Polytechnic (Etobicoke). The OCAA also has Women’s teams from Loyalist College (Belleville), St. Lawrence College (Kingston) and Men’s teams from Conestoga College (Kitchener) and Sheridan College (Brampton). Fanshawe won the OCAA Men’s team event led by their individual champion Matt Talbot (Ailsa Craig, ON) while the Mohawk Women’s team took Ontario Gold with Sheridan’s Mette Siemens (Saskatoon, SK) finishing as the top female runner.

The Alberta Colleges Athletic Association (ACAC) will be represented by nine teams including Men’s and Women’s squads from Northern Alberta Institute of Technology Polytechnic (Edmonton, AB) and Lethbridge Polytechnic (Lethbridge, AB). Medicine Hat College (Medicine Hat, AB) and Red Deer Polytechnic (Red Deer, AB) will be sending a Women’s team while Southern Alberta Institute of Technology (Calgary, AB) and University of Alberta-Augustana (Camrose, AB) have qualified Men’s teams. Red Deer won the Alberta Women’s title while Cadence Laplante (Okotoks, AB) of St. Mary’s University ran to individual Gold. SAIT was dominant in the Alberta Men’s race who swept the top four spots for the team title and were led by Nathan Woyessa (Calgary, AB).

The Atlantic Collegiate Athletic Association will be sending a total of 11 runners including their Men’s conference team champion from Crandall University (Moncton, NB) along with individual entries led by ACAA Men’s Individual winner Zach Comber (Kingston, ON) from Dalhousie Agricultural Campus (Truro, NS) and Women’s title holder Madesen Allen (Dartmouth, NS) from Mount St. Vincent University (Halifax, NS).

Réseau du sport étudiant du Québec has been the top performing conference in recent national history and send the largest contingent with 15 total schools including Men’s and Women’s teams from Cégep Garneau and Cégep de Sainte-Foy who are both from Québec City, QC. La belle province will also feature Women’s teams from Cégep Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu (Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, QC), Cégep de Trois-Rivières (Trois-Rivières, QC) and Dawson College (Montreal, QC) and Men’s teams from Cégep de Saint-Jérôme (Saint-Jérôme, QC), Champlain College-Lennoxville (Sherbrooke, QC) and John Abbott College (Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue, QC). Sainte-Foy took the Men’s Quebec team title and Silver Medalist Xavier St-Onge (Saguenay, QC) from Chicoutimi is the top performer from his province at the Nationals. Léane Baril (Rouyn-Noranda, QC) topped the podium and led Garneau to the Quebec Women’s team title.

The St. Clair Saints were 4th as a team in the OCAA Women’s event while the Men finished 5th but had three individual athletes finish with All-Ontario recognition. Victoria Horrobin (Wallaceburg, ON) earned First-Team All-Ontario honours for the Saints finishing 6th and Carter Free (Napanee, ON) was also a First-Team All-Ontario performer in the Men’s race placing 6th while Melein Keflay (Windsor, ON/Assumption) was 11th which earned him inclusion with the Second-Team All-Ontario group for the Saints.