IU wins Indiana Intercollegiates race

For the past four years, the No. 29 IU women's cross country team has entered the Indiana Intercollegiates to run against the rest of the state of Indiana. After Friday's race, they've come out on top each time.\nLed by a first-place finish from senior All-American Jessica Gall, the Hoosiers finished with 38 points, 51 points better than second-place Valparaiso. Purdue finished third with 135 points, Indiana State finished fourth with 138 points and Ball State scored 148 points to round out the top five teams. The race featured 211 runners from more than 25 NCAA Divison-I, Division-II and Division-III schools in Indiana.\n"I thought the meet went pretty well," IU coach Judy Wilson said. "I wanted Jess to go all out, and she was able to do that."\nBehind Gall, who set a career-best 5K time of 17:36.30, the Hoosiers collected scores from senior Lindsay Hattendorf (fourth place), sophomore Wendi Robinson (fifth place), sophomore Stephanie Greer (13th place) and freshman Kellee Lemcke (15th place).\nSophomore Ashley Sommer (24th place), freshman Kristina Trcka (31st place), freshman Hailee Elmore (35th place) and freshman Rachel Ehret (65th place) also competed in the race for IU.\nAfter running their first two meets on their home course and then enduring a week of hard practice, the Hoosiers traveled to Terre Haute for Friday's meet.\n"We were tired," Wilson said. "We had a meet on our course last week against Michigan, and then we ran long runs in the six days in between the meets, which was kind of tough on some of the girls."\nThe Hoosiers will have a week off before their next meet at the Bill Dellinger Invitational at the University of Oregon. The meet will include No. 5 Brigham Young University, No. 7 Duke University, No. 8 University of Arkansas, No. 21 University of Washington, No. 28 Wake Forest University and No. 30 Oregon.\n"We're going to push through this week, and then we're probably going to back off next week for Oregon," Wilson said.\nOne of the issues that the Hoosiers are looking to improve upon is the time difference between their top two runners, Wilson said.\n"The split between our first two runners is really important," Wilson said. "Last week it was 1:02, but I would like to get it down to 40 seconds."\nWith only three more meets before the Big Ten Championship Oct. 29, the Hoosiers are looking to come on strong toward the end of the season.\n"We're just going out each week, and we're going to try and get better each time," Wilson said.