After a hard week of training, the University of Evansville cross country teams will travel south to Cookeville, Tennessee this afternoon to take part in the Tennessee Tech Invitational.  The Purple Aces are out to defend their team titles from a year ago this afternoon, as both the UE men and the UE women are reigning Tennessee Tech Invitational champions.

The Purple Aces have not competed since placing second on both the men’s and women’s sides at the Fleet Feet Sports/Earl Jacoby Memorial in Huntsville, Alabama on Saturday, September 20.  Today’s meet begins the final stretch run for the Purple Aces, who will alternate weeks of competition and training from now until the NCAA?Great Lakes Regional Championships in November.

“We have had a very good two-week period of hard training, and now it is time to get out and see how much we have improved over the last two weeks,” said UE head coach Don Walters.  “With the changing of the seasons the past week, we have had some people under the weather this week, so we might not be running at full capacity as a team, but that is when other people need to step up and help fill the role of their teammate.”

Not only will both teams be out to defend their overall titles this afternoon, but junior Greg Pulscher (Colorado Springs, Colo./Liberty) will also be looking to defend his individual title on the men’s side.  Pulscher paced UE last time out with a second-place finish at the Earl Jacoby Memorial, while senior Franny Enzler (Evansville, Ind./Memorial) led the UE women with a seventh-place individual finish.

Today's meet begins at 3:00 p.m. with the women's 5-K race.  The men's 8-K race is set to follow at 3:45.