After a three-week break, Texas A&M cross country will host 40 teams at the seventh-annual Arturo Barrios Invitational at Watts Cross Country Course on Friday.
The men’s 8K race is scheduled to begin at 8:30 a.m. with the women’s 6K race at 9:15 a.m. More than 800 runners will jockey against the Aggies, hailing from schools including Oklahoma, Baylor, TCU and Houston.
Both the men’s and women’s teams placed in the top-10 at last year’s Arturo Barrios Invitational, with the men claiming fourth place with 192 points and the women taking seventh place with 231 points.
The Aggies’ season record stands at 16-24 for the men’s division and 18-24 for the women’s division after placing 23rd and 24th out of 25 teams, respectively, in the men’s and women’s divisions at the Nuttycombe Wisconsin Invitational on Sept. 27. Among the elite competition the Aggies faced at the event were 16 of the 25 men’s teams and 13 of the 24 women’s teams that competed at the 2023 national championship meet.
Freshman Megan Roberts was the top point scorer for the Aggies with a 96th-place finish in the 6K at a time of 21 minutes and 24.5 seconds. Sophomore Zach Munger placed 88th overall for the men with a time of 24:35.9.
Arturo Barrios set school records in the 3,000-meter steeplechase, 5,000-meter and 10,000-meter races and was a three-time Southwest Conference champion during his time at A&M. Barrios is a member of the Texas A&M Athletics Hall of Fame Class of 1998 and was a silver medalist in the 1985 NCAA Championships in the 10,000m with a record time of 28:42:77.
After graduation, Barrios represented Mexico in the 1988 Olympic Games and set world records at distances of 10,000m, 20,000-meter and one-hour run.
In-state teams for Friday’s meet include Abilene Christian, Houston Christian, Incarnate Word, Lamar, North Texas, Rice, Sam Houston State, SMU (women), Stephen F. Austin, A&M-Texarkana, Tarleton State, TCU, A&M-Corpus Christi, Texas State, Texas Tech and UT-Arlington and UTSA.
Other programs represented are Arizona State, Arkansas State, Boise State, Central Arkansas, Charleston Southern, Colorado (women), Delaware (women), Eastern Michigan, Georgia Tech, Gonzaga, Louisiana, McNeese State, Mercer, Middle Tennessee State, New Mexico State, New Orleans, Nicholls State, North Dakota, Oklahoma City and Youngstown State.
Follow @AggieTFXC on X for updates on the Arturo Barrios Invitational, with results found at Flash Results.
Kaleb Bunker is a political science senior and contributed this article from the course JOUR 359, Reporting Sports, to The Battalion.
