ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.— After a dominating performance in which University of New Mexico cross country runner Weini Kelati won by 49 seconds and broke the Mountain West record by 26 seconds, the Lobo has been named the NCAA Division I National Athlete of the Week by the USTFCCCA.
It is the second time this season that the junior has won the award, with the last time coming on Oct. 7 following a win in the Blue Division race at the Joe Piane – Notre Dame Invitational.
Monday’s accolade is just the latest for the two-time Mountain West champion, in which Kelati has won Mountain West Women’s Peak Athlete of the Week twice, as well as the Mountain West Women’s Conference Athlete of the Year for the second straight year.
Kelati cruised to her second consecutive Mountain West individual title on Friday morning, crossing the line at 19:11.2, 49 seconds ahead of fellow Lobo and runner-up Ednah Kurgat.
With the win, the Lobo runner became just the second Mountain West individual champion to go back-to-back, joining Emma Bates of Boise State who won in 2013 and 2014, as well as the second runner to win multiple individual championships on the women’s side. Kelati’s win also continued the streak of UNM taking both the individual title and the team title for the fourth consecutive year.
During the 6K championship race, Kelati led from the start, checking in at 3:21.7 through the first split of 1.1K and just 0.6 seconds ahead of UNM junior Adva Cohen in second. However, at the 2K marker, Kelati expanded her lead to 10.2 seconds at 6:10.5, which more than quadrupled to 49 seconds throughout the remainder of the course.
For comparison, Kelati won the MW title in 2018 with a time of 19:49.3, an improvement of over 39 seconds, a race she won by 18.1 seconds over Kurgat.
The Lobos would go on to win their 12th consecutive MW team title with three runners finishing in the top five, four in the top 10 and all five scorers in the top 13 to finish with 31 team points.
Kelati and the Lobos resume postseason competition on Nov. 15 at the NCAA Mountain Region in Salt Lake City, Utah for the opportunity to qualify for the NCAA Championships on Nov. 23.