Valby Turns Her Sights on Stillwater and the NCAA Championship
Parker Valby seeks a National Title at the NCAA Cross Country Championships
GAINESVILLE, Fla. – For the second consecutive year, Parker Valby will represent the Florida Gators at the NCAA Cross Country Championships. On Saturday at 10:20 a.m. ET, the Women’s 6K championship race will begin, and Valby will attempt to cap off her impressive season with a National Title.
So far this season, Valby has competed in three races, placing first in each and rewriting the record books along the way.
At the Arturo Barrios Invite, she placed first with a time of 18:58.2, finishing 1:04.1 ahead of the second-place runner. The following meet at the SEC Championships, she ran an 18:25.87 in the 6K, the fastest 6K time ever recorded at a championship event. This time broke the previous school record by 29.11 seconds and beat second-placed Mercy Chelangat, the 2020 National Title winner, by 7.8 seconds. Last week, at the NCAA Regionals, Valby finished first again, with a time of 19:17.20, 17.9 seconds faster than the runner-up.
This season Valby has run three of the top four times in school history in the 6K, and for her career, she now has four of the top six times in school history. Along with the records, she has been named SEC Women’s Runner of the Year, USTFCCCA National Athlete of the Week (Oct. 31), and SEC Women’s Runner of the Week (Oct. 18) in addition to her USTFCCCA All-South Region and First Team All-SEC honors.
On Saturday, Valby hopes to add to the accomplishments and do something that has never been done before in school history, win a National Championship in Cross Country. Prior to the 2022 season, the women’s team had a runner compete in 25 National Championships but never won the top honors. In 1984, Shelly Steely got close with a second-place finish in the 5K, running 6.6 seconds behind the Champion. Since then, only two Gator women’s runners have finished in the top 15 individually, Becki Wells (12th in 1995) and Rebecca Lowe (15th in 2009). Last season at her first National Championship, Valby finished 27th, but with a strong showing in her final races this year, she is well-positioned to make a run at the title.
Live results will be provided by PT Timing and are available here<https://live.pttiming.com/XC-PTT.html?mid=5234>.
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