Future Teammates Outdistance Field in Newhall Run : Sport: They place 1-2 in the 11th edition of the 5K race. The rivals will compete together on the Adams State cross-country team in Colorado.

Peter De La Cerda and Robert Nelson dueled as rivals in Sunday’s Independence Day Classic 5K run in Newhall, but in two months they’ll be teammates on the powerful Adams State College in Colorado cross-country team.

De La Cerda, this year’s NCAA Division II champion in the 10,000 meters for Adams State, recorded a time of 15 minutes and 11 seconds over the 5,000-meter course to win the 11th edition of the race. Nelson finished second in 15:23.

Tracy Rose of Newhall easily won the women’s division in 17:18 with recent Saugus High graduate Jessica Barraza second in 18:48.

De La Cerda and Nelson, who will attend Adams State in the fall after completing his junior college eligibility at Glendale, ran two abreast for the first 900 meters before De La Cerda took charge. The former Granada Hills High standout had a 10-second lead on Nelson when he came through the mile mark in 4:35, and his advantage had grown to 14 seconds at two miles as Mark LaPlant briefly moved into second place.

“I was hoping to run 14:40,” De La Cerda said. “But it’s hard to do that when you’re by yourself. You have a tendency to relax and slow down when you get a big lead and then it’s hard to pick it back up. It’s hard to kick it back into gear.”

Nelson, who set a Glendale College record of 8:53.0 in the 3,000-meter steeplechase this season, tapped into some of that speed in the final mile to overhaul LaPlant, who finished third in 15:28.

Dan Berkeland, the 1992 Division II champion in the steeplechase for Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, placed fourth in 15:39 after briefly moving into second after the two-mile mark.

Rose, the 1991 state junior college champion in the 3,000 and 5,000 meters for Long Beach City College, was heavily favored to win the women’s race and she wasted little time showing why, opening up a 17-second gap on Barraza at the mile--5:21 to 5:38--and expanding it to the finish.

Barraza qualified for this year’s state high school championships in the 1,600 meters, but it will take some time before she’s able to hold her own with the 30-year-old Rose in the longer distances.

Rose, who is married and the mother of one, was a NCAA Division II All-American swimmer for Cal State Northridge from 1983-85 when she competed as Tracy McCluskey, her maiden name.

There were 420 finishers in Sunday’s race, which started and finished at Newhall Memorial Park.