2018 Schedule Released for Women's Cross Country
7/3/2018 10:06:00 AM | Women's Cross Country
• 2018 U-M Women's Cross Country Schedule
ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- The two-time reigning Big Ten and three-time reigning NCAA Great Lakes Region champion University of Michigan women's cross country team announced Tuesday (July 3) the eight-race schedule for its 2018 campaign, which features regular-season trips to each of the venues that will host postseason competition.
Michigan will compete twice at the sites of the Big Ten Championships (Lincoln, Nebraska) and the NCAA Championships (Madison, Wisconsin) -- both of which are hosting its respective championships for the first time. In addition to the NCAA Great Lakes Regional (Terre Haute, Indiana), the regular season will also feature meets at Louisville and two in nearby Dexter, Michigan, to round out the schedule.
The season will begin with the lone home event of the year, the annual Michigan Open (Aug. 31) at Hudson Mills Metropark in Dexter. Admission to the meet is free, though all vehicles are subject to a $7 daily entry fee upon entry to the park.
Two weeks later, the squad will head to Nebraska for it first look at the Big Ten Championships course at the Greeno/Dirksen Invitational (Sept. 15) at the Pioneers Park. The meet is expected to draw several rival Big Ten schools as the conference tests out the course ahead of the first-ever Big Ten Championships in Lincoln since Nebraska joined the conference ahead of the 2011 season.
After a bye weekend, U-M next competes at the Greater Louisville Classic (Sept. 29) -- the site of last season's NCAA Championships where the Wolverines were ninth in the nation -- in what will likely be the squad's toughest challenge of the season to that point.
Following another bye weekend, the Wolverines will compete in the climax of the regular-season schedule at the Pre-National Invitational (Oct. 14) in Madison.
Annually one of the top regular-season fixtures of the national cross country schedule and always held on the same course that hosts the NCAA Championships, this year's edition will be contested at Zimmer Championship Course. Nearly every single ranked team in the country and many more will be on hand to preview the course ahead of its first-ever NCAA Championships hosting duties.
Select members of the team will get a final tune-up for the postseason the following weekend with a return to Hudson Mills Metropark for the Eastern Michigan Fall Classic (Oct. 19).
The postseason begins one week later as the Wolverines will aim to defend their back-to-back titles at the Big Ten Championships (Oct. 28) hosted by Nebraska.
NCAA postseason competition will begin two weekends afterwards with the NCAA Great Lakes Regional (Nov. 10) in Terre Haute. The Wolverines have claimed each of the past three regional titles and six of the last seven.
The top two teams in the Great Lakes Regional standings will automatically advance to the NCAA Cross Country Championships (Nov. 18) in Louisville. Michigan has qualified for each of the past 16 NCAA Championship meets -- the third-longest active streak in the nation -- and all but two years dating back to the 1988 season. The Wolverines have finished top-10 nationally in five of the past six seasons, headlined by a runner-up finish two years ago.
