Cardinals set for Paul Short Run on Friday in Pa.

WASHINGTON – After two weeks off, CUA will continue its season on Friday afternoon when the Cardinals travel to Bethlehem, Pa. for the 2012 Paul Short Run.  The event will take place on the campus of Lehigh University and feature more than 5,000 runners from over 450 colleges across the country.

The CUA women have had a strong start to their year posting back-to-back top-three finishes at the Wilmington University Invite and Juniata Invitational. 

Keely Eckberg has been the Cardinals top performer during the early going, placing seventh at Wilmington in a time of 21:48.25.  Rebecca Radcliffe finished 11th at Wilmington, while Grace Lally was 16th and Laura Kinley 18th.

One week later, Eckberg crossed in fifth place with a time of 24:11.30, while Kinley was ninth, Cristine Butrico was 14th and Radcliffe came in 20th.

CUA finished 25th at last year’s Paul Short Run with Eckberg the top returning performer.  She placed 82nd with a time of 25:26.

On the men’s side, freshman Matthias Arauco-Shapiro has been a pleasant surprise, leading the Cardinals in both races.  He crossed second overall at Wilmington in a time of 29:42.54 to help lead CUA to a third place finish in the nine-team field.

Fellow freshmen Michael Wood (10) and John Brewer (15) joined Arauco-Shapiro in the top-15 finishers.

At Juniata, Arauco-Shapiro crossed in ninth place with a time of 27:32.50 and was joined in the top-30 by Wood (13) and Brewer (28).

The Cardinals placed 28th out of 42 entries at last year’s Paul Short Run with current sophomore Dylan Jones the top returning performer.  Jones placed 93rd with a time of 28:25.

For more information on this weekend’s races, click here.

The CUA men will race at 1:45 on Friday afternoon with the women to follow at 2:30.