The Cerritos College men's cross country team was given an opportunity to compete with UCLA on Friday. Running in an 8K race at The Rose Bowl in Pasadena, the Falcons were included in the university's meet and had several outstanding times. The team will now take the remainder of the month off before they run in the South Coast Conference Championships on November 1 at Heartwell Park in Lakewood.

Near the front of the pack from the outset, sophomore Jonathan Bazinet (California HS) showed he was worthy of running with four-year competition, as he came in third place overall and was only beaten out by a pair of unattached runners. Bazinet completed the course in a time of 24:53.27, with the winning time turned in at 24:22.68. He finished seven seconds ahead of the first UCLA runner and several Bruin alumni runners.

Freshman Josh Roldan (California HS) posted a time of 25:12.10 to finish in seventh place out of the 34 runners that completed the course, while freshman teammate Omar Torres (Warren HS) checked in with a time of 25:36.86 to earn 12th place overall.

As a team, the Falcons entered 20 runners with a pair of trios finishing in a block together. Sophomore Elvis Salinas (Norwalk HS) came in 17th place in 26:03.33, with freshmen Chris Ramirez (California HS; 26:13.61; 18th place) and Anthony Lozano (La Serna HS; 26:32.80; 19th place) not far behind. The next set of Cerritos runners to finish the course consisted of Francisco Ortiz (Katella HS; 26:43.33; 21st place), David Pleitez (Lakewood HS; 26:51.13; 22nd place) and Paul Mora (Whittier HS; 27:07.74; 23rd place).