Rome, GA – The Piedmont College Cross Country teams ended the season at the South/Southeast Regional at Berry College Saturday morning with the men finishing in 25th overall and Ashley Brunner running her second best time of her career as the only female competitor for the Lady Lions.
Each of the men improved upon their time from the regional competition last season and leading the charge was sophomore Cody Parker who came in 98th in the region running 28:07.28 taking off 1:27 from his time in the same meet last season. In his final race in the Green and Gold, Bryce Thorson had his best regional performance of his career with a 29:16.99, shaving 35 seconds off his time from a year ago.
Cory McClung entered coming off his personal best at the USA South Conference Championship and ran a 29:54.58, improving by 42 seconds from his first regional competition. Alec Jameson finished as the Lions fifth runner at the conference meet but was the fourth Lion to cross the line Saturday finishing with a time of 30:10.25, 54 seconds better than the previous year. Rounding out the top five was Esteban Salazar finishing just two spots behind Jameson and four seconds back at 30:14.40, also 54 seconds better than last season.
The lone Lady Lion making the trip was Ashley Brunner competing for the third time in the Green and Gold as she ran her second best time of the year coming across in 26:01.82, 14 seconds quicker than her first race on the same course. Brunner edged out 19 runners from across the USA South from Covenant, Meredith, Mary Baldwin, LaGrange and Maryville.
Last season the men finished as the 24th of 24 teams at the regional while this season the Lions edged out three teams including finishing one spot ahead of fellow USA South school Maryville. In total, three USA South schools competed on the men’s side.
