Saturday’s Central Collegiate Invitational cross country tournament will be a preview of next month’s Mid American Conference Championship — in more ways than one.

The 79th annual invitational includes conference teams, Bowling Green, Kent State, Akron, Buffalo, Eastern Michigan, Western Michigan, Central Michigan, Northern Illinois and Toledo, as well as non-conference participants, Youngstown, Heidelberg and Defiance.

The Ottawa Hills Golf Course will play host to both the MAC Championships as well as Saturday’s meet.

“I believe you face competition head on, so I am always happy to see other MAC schools,” said BGSU head coach Cami Wells. “They are our competition and we look forward to racing with them this weekend.”

With the course foreign to many of the Falcons, Wells is hoping her runners can become acquainted with the site in preparation for the league meet on Oct. 30.

“We are looking forward to racing on the Toledo course,” Wells said. “Since many of our runners are new, this will be their first time running on the course.”

The Falcons are coming off a fourth place finish in the Mel Brodt Invitational last Saturday on the campus of BGSU. Rogers Kipchumba finished fourth overall in 25:39 to lead the orange and brown. Fellow Kenyan Edwin Cheriuyot finished second on the team in a time of 26:17. Bryan Jackson (26th), Steve Vairetta (35th) and Ryan Rohrer (38th) rounded out the Falcon scoring.

“They have been working hard and our mileage is still high at this point and our workouts are long,” Wells said. “Once we get through September we will start doing more speed work and focus more on racing.”

Unique to the Central Collegiate Invitational is the addition of two high school races. Wells will use the race as a recruiting tool to scout potential future Falcon men and women.

“It is kind of a nice setup and I will definitely have my eyes open scouting the field,” she said.