COLORADO SPRINGS - Westminster women's cross country runner, Saydi Anderson, was named the conference's Runner of the Week as announced by the league office on Wednesday.  Her 5k time of 17:50.21 gave her a third-place finish individually in the women's gold race and helped the Westminster to its second consecutive first-place finish as a team.

"A well earned award," said head coach Dan Quinn.  "It was an impressive feat to record that personal best time at a major invitational.  She raised the bar for the team and I am certain that more will surpass that time as we move into conference and NCAA championships," said Quinn.

The new PR for Anderson placed her ahead of all other RMAC competitors in attendance and also put her ahead of runners from four nationally ranked teams and six regionally ranked teams in the largest-ever field to compete in the annual meet hosted Fort Hays State.

"We have put a lot of consistent work in over the last two months of the season, so going into the race I felt very confident," Anderson said.  "The plan from the start was to go out fast.  Our team motto is, 'hashtag all-in', so I committed to that plan right for the start and went for it," said Anderson.

Anderson ran a time of 17:50.21 to finish third overall and Westminster women's cross country finished in first-place as a team with an average time of 18:32 at the Tiger Open in Victoria, Kan.

The meet was the last before conference as Westminster will now turn its attention to the 2021 RMAC Conference Championships which will be held on Saturday, Oct. 23, at the Applewood Golf Course in Golden, Colo.  Qualifying participants will then move onto the NCAA South Central Region meet in Lubbock, Texas, on Saturday, Nov. 6.

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