Santiago Hardy (Navajo) finished with an 8th place finish at the NAIA National XC Championships

UAV Communications

VANCOUVER, WA – On a cold and soggy Friday morning, the NAIA’s best runners nationwide converged upon the Fort Vancouver National Historic Championship Course for the 66^th Annual Men’s Cross Country National Championship in Vancouver, WA.

The 2021 Cal Pac Runner of the Year Santiago Hardy (Navajo) ran a great race today and finished with an 8^th place finish out of 324 runners with a run time of 25.15.5. In 2019, Hardy finished in 20^th out of 335 runners and beat his time on this course by .2 seconds.

Head coach Daniel Tustin was pleased with Hardy’s performance. “Santiago executed his best possible race. The past 6 months of training paid off and everything came together. He left no doubts!”

Santiago is happy with his performance as well. “I felt good coming into the race” said Hardy. “The course was something unexpected. Little patchy, uneven areas along with hills and mud. It’s how cross country is supposed to be. Other than that, I raced the best of my ability.”

NDNSPORTS STAFF