Cheney, a former Utah Valley standout, wins 8-kilometer invitational race, then returns to compete in open section at Ag-Ops Course; Trimble leads five Wolverines in top eight to secure women’s victory with 20 points, with Southern Utah placing five athletes in top 20 to prevail in men’s race

By Landon Negri for DyeStat

RIVERSIDE, Calif. – The nice thing about early morning invitationals for college students is having the rest of the day to themselves.

They might hang out with friends, or even go to the beach, especially when running for a school far away from the UC Riverside campus.

INTERVIEWS

As for Habtamu Cheney? He just keeps running ... and running ... and running.

Cheney followed up his men's invitational 8-kilometer victory Saturday morning by running four miles for tempo and then pacing along in the open race.

Running unattached, the former Utah Valley standout ran the 8-kilometer layout in 23 minutes, 35.3 seconds, joining Utah Valley sophomore Ari Trimble (20:03.4) as winners in the UC Riverside Cross Country Invitational at the school's Ag-Ops course.

Trimble led Utah Valley's women to an easy win, as they scored 20 points to runner-up Long Beach State with 103. Southern Utah's men, which put five runners in the top 20, won the men's side with 41 points.

Utah Valley finished second as a team with 104 points as the Beehive State was impressive overall.

Cheney is training for next month's McKirdy Micro marathon in New York. So there was a reason it seemed like his feet never stopped moving Saturday morning as he was training toward the Olympic Marathon Trials qualifying time of 2:18.00 – and faster.

"Today was just getting 15 miles of quality near that pace, or slightly faster than that," Cheney said.

Cheney wasn't an official entrant in the open race, so he pulled off the course right before the finish line. Still, he accomplished what he wanted to get done Saturday morning.

"Everything went according to plan," Cheney said. "The last month and a half, I've been hitting 100-mile weeks, so I feel crazy strong. I wish I had cross country eligibility. I think I could be All-American."

Cheney does have one more season of track eligibility, but is unsure whether he will use it.

Behind Cheney was runner-up and Arizona junior Iker Sanchez Lopez, who ran 23:43.5. Salvador Capetillo, running for Performance Elite, placed third in 23:46.2.

Capetillo, a Baldwin Park High grad, is a former Mt. SAC standout who then went to Adams State. He said he stopped running during the COVID-19 pandemic, but has come back to the sport.

"When I saw everybody continued running," Capetillo said, "and all the performances still going on – like everybody has been running fast – I was like, 'Wow, maybe I should have kept running.'"

After taking a year off, he said he moved to Durango, Colo., and began training on his own. Saturday marked one year since his return to cross country competition.

"Last year was my first cross country race in three years," he said.

Then, he said he caught the eye of Azusa Pacific coaches when he ran at the Bryan Clay Invitational in the spring and joined their team, but was out of college eligibility for cross country, which is how he wound up running for Performance Elite.

A trio of Southern Utah runners followed, marking their team victory. Junior Travis Feeny was fourth in 23:47.6, junior Santiago Gaitan secured sixth in 23:49, and freshman Jacob Peterson took seventh in 23:51.

Freshman Noah Jenkins (13th, 24:06.2) and junior Coleman Cragun (20th, 24:13.6) rounded out the Thunderbirds' scorers.

"I think we performed really well," Gaitan said. "I think, at the moment, we're in a really good spot. We've got to keep our heads pretty level, though. We've got Notre Dame in two weeks, which is where we'll get most of our points to try and qualify for nationals."

Southern Utah sandwiched Ian Crocker, who, running unattached, finished fifth in 23:48.3.

Mt. San Antonio College freshman Matthew Donis, California's high school state champion in the 3,200 meters during the spring track season, was the highest community college finisher, placing eighth in 23:52.0.

Performance Elite's Jesus Alvarado was ninth in 23:55.5 and Utah Valley junior Guled Mohamid was 10th in 24:00.0

Trimble led a dominating Utah Valley performance on the women's side. The sophomore paced a pack of five Utah Valley scorers in the top eight.

"I felt good and I was just trying to make surges around corners and downhills – like 10-step surges," Trimble said. "And one of them just put me ahead."

Junior Morgan French (second, 20:13.6), junior Anna Martin (20:21.9), freshman Lydia Beus (seventh, 20:23.7) and sophomore Abbie Fuhriman (eighth, 20:24.8) rounded out Utah Valley's scorers.

"I think we have a very new team – we had a lot of girls graduate last year and so yeah, it's important that we're new, but we're here for it," Trimble said.

UC Irvine showed top-10 strength, too, Saturday with juniors Anna Vogtmann placing third in 20:19.0 and Sameen Andar finishing sixth in 20:23.0.

Running unattached, Madison Debos finished fourth in 20:21.3.

Southern Utah junior Sariah Hernandez challenged for the lead, before settling for ninth in 20:28.4.

Claremont-Mudd-Scripps senior Natalie Bitetti led her team to a third-place finish with a 10th-place individual effort in 20:32.7.

Another Southern Utah runner, sophomore Nethaneel Taylor, won the Open Division race in 24:59.6.

And for the second time in three years, UNLV's Natalia Ruiz Lara won the women's Open Division race. She clocked 17:02.2 on Saturday, 24 seconds faster than her 2021 win.