Oct. 10, 2006

BOCA RATON,FL - The Florida Atlantic University men's and women cross country teams will compete at two separate meets this week.

The Owls head into the week with added confidence coming off of the Disney World Invitational. The women finished 6th in a 36-team field and the men posted a 19th place finish.

The team will travel to Miami on Thursday to compete in a triangle meet with Florida International and the University of Miami before heading to DeLand on Friday to take part in the Stetson Invitational. The task of competing on consecutive days will be a challenge, but there is a reason for the aggressive scheduling.

"We will be using the triangle meet as a makeup meet for our men, because they did not compete as a team at the Nova Southeastern meet earlier this year," said head cross country coach Alex Smolka. "The meet will also give some of our women that haven't gotten to run as often a chance to compete."

Of Friday's Stetson meet, Smolka said, "We will use it as a time trial for both our men and women and it will go along way towards determining who gets to go to the Sun Belt Conference Championships."

The triangle meet with UM and Florida International University begins at 5:30 pm on Thursday. The Stetson Invitational event starts at 4:30 p.m. with the Women's 5K, followed by the Men's 8K at 5:10 p.m.