Brie Oakley dominates field
Brie Oakley showed why she is the No. 1 ranked cross country runner in America with a dominant 28-second win, even after falling flat to the ground in the final mile. Her final time of 17:10.1 was 14 seconds off of Katie Rainsberger's course record, but the Cal-Berkeley commit said she wasn't worried about time today.
She had a four-second at the mile in 5:20.4. By the two mile, Oakley extended her lead to 25 seconds as she crossed in 10:52 and the chase pack of No. 8 Lauren Gregory, No. 2 Kelsey Chmiel and No. 6 Allie Schadler crossed in 11:17.
Oakley won handily despite the fall and the race for second saw Oregon sophomore, No. 18 Ember Stratton kick down Gregory in the final meters, 17:38.2 to 17:39.8.
Chmiel placed fifth in 17:41.1 and Schadler was seventh 17:48.6 while eighth grader Grace Ping (#9) --who set an age 13 world record for road 5K in 16:36 last week-- was sixth in 17:48.3 and fourth place went to Anna Gibson (#25), an elite cross-country skier from Wyoming who will attend Brown next year.
Oakley's dominant win is particularly impressive as she has only run competitively for the past calendar year. She advanced to NXN last fall during her first-ever cross country season and placed 26th in Portland.
Ember Stratton talks about her breakthrough second place finish at NXN after taking third at the Northwest regional: