ERIC M. JUKELEVICS/Arizona Daily Wildcat UA senior Tara Chaplin runs in the 3,000m Saturday at the Jim Click Shootout at Drachman Stadium. Chaplin and a group of other Wildcat distance runners will compete in the Stanford Invitation in Stanford, Calif. today.

After two straight home meets, members of the Arizona track and field team will head to Palo Alto, Calif., this weekend for the Stanford Invitational.

The meet will be primarily a distance competition, so UA coaches Dave Murray and Fred Harvey have opted to send a handful of their top distance runners.

Wildcat runners will be faced with a big challenge today as they go head-to-head with competition from the nation's elite track and field schools.

Stanford, Louisiana State, Southern California and Washington will make up the rest of the field.

While Arizona brings the highest-ranked team into the meet with the women at No. 5, all four of the other teams come in ranked in the Top 25 in the latest Trackwire poll.

"This meet is real important to our distance runners," Murray said. "We're sending the people we think have a good chance to qualify, but they have to run fast to be automatic qualifiers."

Coach Murray has decided to take senior Tara Chaplin, sophomore Beth Hoge, junior Kim Bates, senior Steve Smith, sophomore Mark Anderson and senior Tom Prindiville up to the Stanford meet.

"I think Tara Chaplin has the best chance to place high," Murray said, "and she's qualified the past two years at this event. She'll be running the 5,000m this week and the 10,000m in three weeks, which is really her specialty."

Arizona is also attempting to get sophomore Amy Linnen into the pole vault event in an effort for her to practice at what will be the site of the USA Championships.

"Hopefully, Amy Linnen will have an opportunity to vault. The USA Championships will be held at Stanford in June, and we want to get her some practice," Harvey said. "Right now, she's capable of competing with anyone in the world."

After a victorious performance last week in the Jim Click Invitational, the teams will look to carry that momentum into this weekend.

With 16 Pac-10 qualifying performances and six NCAA provisional performances, the Wildcats continue to improve week after week.

Although the outdoor season is still young, Murray said he is proud of his team's progress.

"We've done very well," Murray said. "The people who we've depended on have not let us down."

"Julie De Marni has become a contender for the national championship in javelin, Angela Foster is almost back to where she should be, and Abby Peters has recovered nicely from her hip injury," Murray said.

"We haven't had any major problems, and I'm pleased with the way everything has been going so far."