BYU sophomore Miles Batty gave all he had, sprinting to the end and collapsing right after crossing the finish line.

But it just wasn’t enough. He, and his men’s team, finished second.
In the women’s race, junior Cecily Lemmon-Lew dominated, finishing more than 20 seconds ahead of second place. However, the next three runners behind Lemmon-Lew were from New Mexico, leaving BYU with another second-place finish.

The MWC Cross Country Championships were held in Orem on Saturday in front of hundreds of Cougar fans. Even Cosmo was there, sporting some short shorts of his own.

But it was New Mexico that ran away with all the trophies instead of host BYU. The New Mexico women’s team won its second-consecutive MWC championship and the men’s team won the title for the first time ever.

“It’s never fun to lose, but New Mexico came out and ran hard and deserved the victory,” said BYU women’s cross country head coach Patrick Shane. “The first mile we were doing very well but lost it midway through the race and couldn’t execute our plan to run together. We congratulate New Mexico for a good performance.”

The Lobos were led by senior Jacob Kirwa, from Kenya, who finished the 8K race with a record time of 23:34.5. BYU’s Batty finished just one second behind Kirwa.

“We both started sprinting side-by-side for the last 500 meters,” Batty said. “[Kirwa] just had a little bit more in him than me.”

Batty was named to the 2009 Men’s All-MWC First Team along with teammates Richard Nelson and Nate Ogden. Alden Bahr, Brandon Hebbert and Ryan Merriman made it to the Second Team.

Lemmon-Lew finished the 6K race with a time of 20:47.4. She was named the 2009 MWC Women’s Athlete of the Year in addition to earning a spot on the All-MWC First Team.
Katy Andrews was also named to the First Team, while Angela Wagner and Nicole Nielsen earned Second Team honors. Nielsen also was named Freshman of the Year.

The men and women will get a rematch with New Mexico on Nov. 14 at the NCAA Mountain Region Championships in Albuquerque, N.M.