KALAMAZOO, Mich. – With the regular season behind them, the Western Michigan cross country team travels to Oxford, Ohio for the 2017 Mid-American Conference Championships on Saturday, Oct. 28.

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"We are really looking forward to anytime you can line up in conference play," commented WMU associate head coach Taryn Sheehan. "What's really awesome about our championship is that we get to see these teams throughout the season so we have gotten certain barometers to measure going into Saturday. It creates a great sense of rivalry and great tradition going back years and years in the conference. We are really excited for this part of the season."

Saturday's race consists of 11 women's teams including Eastern Michigan who has won the previous two championships. The men's race is scheduled for 11 a.m. with the women following shortly afterwards at Miami University.

During the 2015 season WMU finished in fourth place, its highest finish at the race since 2003, but without their top-two runners in Maria McDaniel and Claire Gilbert, the Broncos finished eighth at last year's MAC Championships. No. 14 Eastern Michigan won the race for the second consecutive season with a team score of 27. Hanne Christensen led the team while Sarah Anderson finished in second for the Broncos. Christensen placed 16^th with a time of 21:51.8 while Anderson was right behind in 19^th with a time of 21:58.4.

The Broncos will be led by seasoned veteran Christensen, who has been crowned an individual champion two times this season at the George Dales Invite and the Pre-Nationals. The senior has led the Broncos in every race she has competed in this year and will look to do so again on Saturday. Christensen has also racked up conference honors this year, being named MAC Runner of the Week (9/13) and MAC Scholar Athlete of the Week (10/18).

WMU will bring eight other participants for Saturday's contest including senior Gilbert who led the Broncos at the Spartan Invitational back on Sept. 15. Gilbert finished in 22^nd place overall with a 22:30.6 6K time while finishing fourth overall against other conference opponents. The senior also boasted an impressive run at the George Dales Invite finishing second for WMU, shattering her personal record 6K time by 20 seconds. Freshmen Courtney Allen, Emily Fonzi, Rebecca McNamee and Juliane Sormain, junior Sarah Anderson, and sophomores Brittney Hall and Autumn Lewis round out the other Bronco runners.

"The girls have really made strides of getting better every week," added Sheehan. "Hanne has been running exceptionally well but also look for Claire, Sarah and Juliane to make steps forward. Brittney has also been super consistent this season so we are looking forward to another solid performance from her. There are some opportunities for some of the young ones to step up. Autumn has done a great job this season and the freshman have done good job of coming in and figuring out what it's like to race at the high level. We are looking forward to going out there and hopefully surprising some people."