Orozco becomes first Gaucho to win Mt. SAC race

Sophomore Ulysses Orozco became the first Saddleback College harrier to capture the prestigious Mt. SAC Cross Country Invitational, setting a new school record in the process.

Orozco covered the 4-mile course in 20:35, the best time posted by a Gaucho runner since Dan Gaston posted a time of 20:40 during the 1998 season.  Orozco soundly beat out Ethan Walker of College of the Canyons (20:44) by nine seconds for the title and helped the Gauchos to a fourth place team finish.  Mt. San Antonio won the team title (37 points), followed by Canyons (57) and Hartnell (83).  Saddleback finished with 121 team points while Pima (AZ) finished in fifth with 128 points.

Freshman Bryce Callender (22:05) and sophomore Miles Brubacher (22:08) ran together, finishing 27th and 28th, respectively.  The trio of Wyndal Skarsten (22:26), Mark Delgado (22:26), and Ronen Skarsten (22:29) also ran in a pack, finishing 38th, 39th, and 42nd, respectively, out of the 190 competitors who finished the race.

"This was a tremendous accomplishment, an absolutely amazing finish," said Saddleback head coach Matt Sherman.  "We have never had an individual winner at the Mt. SAC Invitational and Uly did it by setting a school record."

The Gauchos will have an extra week to prepare for the Orange Empire Conference championship which will take place on Friday, October 30, at the Irvine Regional Park course starting at 9:00 a.m.  Orozco was the individual runner-up at the conference championship last year, leading Saddleback to a second place team finish.