LA MIRADA---Bethany Mapes and the Biola women's cross country team were honored by the PacWest Conference for their performances at the UC Riverside Invitational. 

Mapes led her team, and PacWest Conference, with an eighth place finish and a time of 20:39 on the 6k course. 

"I was proud of Bethany's performance," shared head coach Sean Henning. "She was not feeling well before the race and threw up a couple of times because of nauseousness. The fact that she went out there and still finished in the top 10 and was the fastest PacWest performer on the day is extremely impressive. She will run even better the rest of the way home this season, I can assure you of that."

Biola finished fifth in a loaded field of 24 Division I, II, III and NAIA teams at the UC Riverside Invite. Mapes led the way and was followed by Hailey Wurzbach (24th, 21:00), Madison Ebright (43rd, 21:12), Elizabeth Kurtz (49th, 21:17) and Jaina Kang (53rd, 21:21) rounded out Biola's top five. 

"We raced some pretty solid schools, including a few that are ranked in our region," stated Henning. "I thought they raced really hard and that means a lot."