Brown finishes in 102nd place at national meet, Donnan injured

HANOVER, Ind. – In his final race as a Patriot, Warren Brown put in his best performance of his career on Saturday at the NCAA Division III Men’s Cross Country National Championships.

Brown finished with a time of 25 minutes and 37 seconds, which put him in 102nd place in the field of 278 runners. That time was three seconds short of the school record, which sat set earlier this season by Ben Donnan on this same course in the pre-national meet on Oct. 4.

“For Warren to run that well in those kinds of conditions was really great for him,” said coach Bob Hepler.

Donnan, a senior, also qualified as an individual for the national meet, but had to withdraw due to a hip injury about two miles into the race.

“He had a hip problem the entire year and it started bothering him and it hurt him so much, he figured why endanger his track season just to finish this race,” Hepler said. “He gave it a good effort but it just didn’t make sense to continue. He has two seasons of tracks eligibility left so it was a wise decision on his part.”

Both the careers of Brown and Donnan now come to an end, but only on the cross country side. Brown holds the school single season record for most individual wins in a season with three. Donnan also holds a school record which is the school’s all-time wins in a career with six, including two American Southwest Conference Championships.

The cross country careers of R.J. Cowan, Corey Kellam and Bojan Kajtaz all came to and end at the regional race when the team finished in third place.

“Not having a track and field program in the past to run year around like other programs have, has been a disadvantage to us. So for us to finish in third these past two years without that program was extremely good for us,” Hepler said. “Centre and Emory just ran really well that day at regionals and we needed to run a perfect race to beat those two teams.”

By Jeremy Cotham Sports Editor