COLUMBIA, Mo. – Courtney Sporrer kept picking runners off Friday during the last 2,000 meters of her race.

Sporrer, a junior from Logan, Iowa, placed 86th at the NAIA Women's Cross Country Championships at Gans Creek Course. Her time on the six-kilometer course was 22 minutes, 36.60 seconds.

"Today was special," said Sporrer in a post-race phone interview. "I'm very happy with the race. I stayed mentally strong through the whole race, and this is my best finish at nationals."

She got boxed in early, and she needed to make the adjustment needed to catch up with the race having more than 300 runners.

"I wanted to get out harder than I did, but the race doesn't always go as planned,"Sporrer said. "That's what happens in big race, but the rest of the race went exactly how I wanted it to go."

At the 3K mark, she was in 111th place, but she knew she could pass some runners, and she did. She moved up 10 spots at the 4K mark, and then five more in the penultimate kilometer.

Then, in her final 1,000 meters, Sporrer advanced 10 more spots, and ran it in 3:40 to earn her 86th-place finish.

"There were so many people around, so that made it easier to attack different groups," Sporrer said. "

This was her third appearance in the NAIA meet.