Benjamin Fazio Helps RPI Cross Country to League Championship

2016 Oct 31

Benjamin Fazio of East Greenwich was an integral part of the nationally-ranked Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) men's cross country team winning its first outright Liberty League Championship on Saturday at Seneca Lake State Park in Geneva, N.Y.

Benjamin, a Materials Engineering major out of East Greenwich High School, is a senior captain who finished first of the 128 runners with a time of 25:22.5 (5:07 pace) to earn All-Liberty League First Team..

RPI, which is coached by John Lynch, had seven of the first 12 finishers in capturing the team title with 22 points. St. Lawrence (62) finished second followed by Vassar (69), RIT (89), Clarkson (145), Union (196), Hobart (212) and Bard (260).

Rensselaer and St. Lawrence University were co-champions in 2005 when they tied for the team title. St. Lawrence had won or shared the Liberty League title in all 21 years since the league's inception in 1995 prior to Saturday's second place finish.

Complete results can be found at http://www.rpiathletics.com/sports/2016/10/29/mxc-at-liberty-league.aspx?id=3740.

The No. 11 Engineers, who have now won three meets this year with one runner-up and a third place finish, are idle until November 12 when they compete in the NCAA Atlantic Regional at Rowan University.

Founded in 1824, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute is America's oldest technological research university. For nearly two centuries, the Institute has been a driving force behind breakthroughs in engineering and science in virtually every arena-from transportation and infrastructure to business, medicine, outer space, and cyberspace.

As it approaches its bicentennial anniversary, the Institute continues to define The New Polytechnic, a new paradigm for teaching, learning, and research that uses advanced technologies to enable fresh collaborations across disciplines, sectors, and regions, in order to answer the global challenges of our day.