The Howard Payne women’s and men’s cross country teams had strong showing at the Bill Libby McMurry Invitational this past weekend.

The HPU men’s team posted an overall time of 2:12:17.41(4-mile) finishing 6th overall and the women were at 2:12:20.55(5K) finishing 6th overall.

Top finisher for the men was John Villagomez at 24:04.18(19th) and top women was Carissa Zarate with a time of 23:32.12(14th). Villagomez was first among DIII and conference runners.
“I am so proud of the effort put forth this weekend at the Bill Libby Invitational by all of our runners,” said HPU head coach David Foster. “I am very pleased with the times we ran this weekend, and we are performing beyond all my expectations for still being so early in the year. I am looking forward to our progress in the upcoming meets leading up to conference, and I am expecting great things from our teams.”

This is the first year back for cross country in 20+ years for Howard Payne. It was a great overall performance against larger schools and established programs.

Howard Payne will take a week off before running in the Texas DIII Championships in Seguin on September 25th.

HPU Men: 4 mile at Bill Libby McM Invitational
19th John Villagomez 24:04.18
27th Malcolm Wentworth 25:15.24
32nd Benton Warren 25:47.67
41st Jeff Chaumet 27:46.53
46th Geremy Garza 29:23.43
48th Sean Locker 29:40.91
HPU Women: 5K at Bill Libby McM Invitational
14th Carissa Zarate 23:32.12
25th Jessica Morales 25:25.27
27th Justin Ferrell-Raborn 25:38.55
39th Tylene Middleton 28:22.46
41st Abby Hinojos 29:22.15
45th Kimble Luna 30:08.10
Men’s over all time – 2:12:17.41
Women’s overall time – 2:12:20.55