Men finish first, women finish fourth at cross country season opener
USU cross country is officially off to the races after Saturday’s season-opening meet at Cache Valley’s American West Heritage Center, which saw mixed results between the men’s and women’s teams.
“This is a meet where we just try to find out where everybody is at,” head coach Gregg Gensel said.
As it stands, after one meet the men’s cross country squad looks to be in a very good spot following a first place finish Saturday. For the women, however, a fourth place finish has them looking ahead to improving upon those standings. Despite the disappointing finish, Gensel isn’t letting himself worry about his women’s squad just yet.
“I liked what I saw today,” he said.
“We’ve got some work cut out for us on the women’s side, but I think they’ll be there when they need to.”
The women started off the event by finishing fourth overall, with the team’s highest finish coming from junior Jessie Chugg in 11th place, with a time of 17:39.3. While the low finish by the women was not their ideal way to open the season, it was partly the result of a plan by the team and coaches to run together for the first mile and a half of the race before breaking apart and trying to close the gap between themselves and the leaders.
“I think we did what we were supposed to do, but I think we need to improve a lot,” Chugg said.
Joining Chugg among the top-15 finishers were USU teammates Ruth Hilton and Kim Quinn, who finished with times of 17:45.6 and 17:57.2, respectively.
The Aggies had four of the top five finishes in the men’s race, and eight of the top 10. Leading the way for that group was junior Brian McKenna, who finished in first place with a time of 21:49.9. McKenna’s time was nearly 10 seconds ahead of Weber State’s Brett Hales, who finished second after leading for the majority of the race.
Just as the women’s team stuck together, the men’s team ran together for the first half of their race before breaking apart and stepping on the accelerator.
“We had a plan and all the guys were in on it,” McKenna said. “We went out hard and everything went as planned.”
During the opening stretch of the race, as the USU team kept itself packed together, Hales opened up a substantial lead, putting the pressure on USU for the second half of the race.
“I just watched him get further and further away, but I had enough foot-speed there at the end to catch him,” McKenna said of Hales.
Following Hales to the finish were three more USU runners in juniors Daniel Howell and Hunter Nelson, with times of 22:02.8 and 22:34, and senior Chio Lopez, who crossed the finish line at 22:40.8.
Rounding out the last four spots of the first 10 to finish the race were USU runners Kyle McKenna, Michael Budge, Eric Larson and and Jacob Barton.
USU’s next cross country event will be the Montana State Open on Sept. 18 and then travel to the University of Notre Dame two weeks later.
– matt.sonn@aggiemail.usu.edu