The men’s and women’s Cross Country squads both claimed the top five spots in their races on Saturday at the Wesleyan Invitational, the first official meet of the season. Led by co-captain Lucia Pier ’08, the women dominated the 5k event, finishing their top five runners in a span of less than 30 seconds. The men found similar success in their 8k event, sweeping the top 15 spots, with captain Sean Watson ’08 leading the pack. Nevertheless, Watson feels like his team could have done better.
Sean’s winning time from Saturday, 27:04.06, is almost 30 seconds slower than his time at the Division III Championships last year, 26:35.00.
“On the whole, Saturday’s race was pretty disappointing. We had essentially zero competition,” he said, pointing to Manhattanville and New England College (their two competitors) as not on par with the Wesleyan squad.
Sean says that both he and the team have a lot of improvement to make. “It takes time to get used to racing [8ks],” Watson noted, and added that team would eventually round out into shape. He insisted that the squad played down to their competition.
“We ran it like a time trial,” he said. “[Cross Country] is 90% mental. You can race with the top guys once you break through the mental barrier…and get the confidence to know you can turn on the accelerator in the last few miles.”
The women had similar feelings about the level of competition this weekend. “Manhattanville and New England College are just not on level with the top colleges in the New England region,” said Hannah Hastings ’08, co-captain of the women’s team.
Much of the credit for the women’s success in the race goes to Lucia Pier, the team’s top finisher in the 5k at 20:07.81.
“[She]…took it a little easier to run with the group in order to help everyone else out,” said Hastings. The team’s strategy of running in a pack also worked to good effect, as Hastings noted the small time gap between the top five finishers. Though there was no one challenging them for those spots this time around, that may change in the next meet.
“The Open New England meet two weeks from now will be a much better indication of where we are in comparison to other NESCAC and New England schools,” Hastings said.
The meet takes place Saturday, October 6th, and starts at 12:30 p.m. Look for Wesleyan to step up their game against some of the top teams from all college divisions, such as Brown, Dartmouth, and Bowdoin.
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