NEWTON, N.C. – The Emory & Henry College Men’s and Women’s Cross Country Teams competed in the Lenoir-Rhyne Invitational held at Southside Park Saturday morning and showed improvement in all aspects over last weekend’s season opening race.  The E&H men finished tied for eighth and the women finished ninth on the day as the only NCAA Division III teams in the field.

The Emory & Henry men were led by freshman Nathan Fishell (Richmond, Va.) as he completed the 8K course in 30:24. Freshmen Steven Machamer (Norfolk, Va.) and Dylan Turner (Roanoke, Va.) finished within a second of one another (31:25 and 31:26, respectively) to round out the Wasps’ top three.

Radford University took home the team title and the Highlanders’ Ryan Farnan won the race, putting up a time of 26:38.

On the women’s side, the Wasps were paced by senior Kaitlyn Phibbs (Saltville, Va.) with a 5K time of 24:41. Freshman Gabbie Rhodes (Richmond, Va.) (25:16) was second for E&H while junior Olivia Bailey (Chilhowie, Va.) and freshman Olivia Knight (Columbia, S.C.) posted times of 26:48 and 26:50, respectively, for E&H.

Lees-McRae College’s Emily Shields earned medalist honors as the only runner to break 20 minutes (19:56) but the host Lenoir-Rhyne Bears won the meet, placing five runners in the top 16.

Emory & Henry will travel to Rock Hill, South Carolina next Saturday to compete in the Winthrop Invitational. The first gun is set to go off at 9:00 a.m.

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