All season long, Laura Aceves has been the story for the Cal State San Bernardino Coyotes cross country team. And on Saturday morning, she showed once again why she is a record-setting runner.
The senior from El Monte tore through the Guasti Regional Park course in record-setting time at the CCAA Championship. She ran the course in 21 minutes, 3.3 seconds, nearly 14 seconds better than runner-up Karlie Garcia of Chico State.
The 13.7-second difference is nearly the equivalent of a 100-yard difference — the distance of a football field.
Not only did Aceves win the event, she shattered the school record time in the 6,000 by 39.9 seconds and broke her personal-best 6K time by 71 seconds.
For her efforts, she was named the CCAA Runner of the Year — a first in school history.
The Coyotes finished sixth in the event with 145 points. Michelle Pineda Palacios was 32nd (22:52.1), followed by Delaney Ellsworth (41st, 23:03.9), Rachel Gee (50th, 23:26.5), Cynthia Rivera (55th, 23:36.3), Jessica Steinhoff (63rd, 23:49.5), Laura Romero (64th, 23:50.0), Phillie Bacon (70th, 24:07.4), Alyssa Casillas (89th, 24:58.4) and Karina Budovec (96th, 25:30.4).
Chico State won the event with 20 points, followed by Cal Poly Pomona (76), Stanislaus State (116), UC San Diego (124) and Humboldt State (145).