OTTAWA, Ont.—Freshman cross country runner Sadie Sigfstead (Edmonton, Alta.) dominated from start to finish and won the Women's U20 race at the Canadian Cross Country Championships this past Saturday. Sigfstead ran the 6,000 meter course at Wesley Clover Parks in Ottawa in 22:14 and crossed the finish line with a winning margin of well over a minute.
 
Saturday's first place finish at the Athletics Canada national championships was nothing new for Sigfstead, who is a previous cross country gold medalist in the U18 division. She is coming off a strong freshman season for Villanova in which she emerged as one of the Wildcats top performers for a young team that qualified for the NCAA Championships earlier this month.
 
The top two finishers in the U20 race on Saturday are affiliated collegiate runners, with Sigfstead pacing the field of 51 competitors and Maya Kobylanski finishing 1:11 off the pace with a runner-up time of 23:25. Kobylanski, from British Columbia, is a sophomore on the cross country and track & field teams at Idaho State. Rounding out the top five U20 finishers were Katie Newlove (23:30), Laurence Gauthier (23:37) and Angelina Shandro (23:50).
 
It was cold and muddy on the course, with temperatures in the teens at the start of the day and warming up only to the mid-20's by the time the U20 races were contested. The race schedule began with a community race and was followed by Master's races and the U18 races before the men's and women's U20 races went off. Sigfstead's winning margin was the most dominant of nay of the races held during the day.
 
"It was a tough, gritty, cold race today," Sigfstead said. "You never really feel great during it. Your momentum gets constantly broken, you had to get used to not feeling smooth. I was happy to be out there today; a great end to the season."
 
Sigfstead was the top Villanova finisher at the 2021 Division I Cross Country Championships just one week before her gold medal finish on her home turf in Canada. She came in 93^rd overall at the NCAA meet with a time of 20:27.5 at Apalachee Regional Park in Tallahassee, Fla. and recorded the best finish by a Wildcats true freshman in 12 years Sigfstead led Villanova at both the Nuttycombe Wisconsin Invitational and the NCAA Championships during her first taste of collegiate competition. She earned first team All-BIG EAST honors and Mid-Atlantic All-Region accolades for the season.