Hawks cross country set personal-bests in NCAA Regionals
The St. Joe’s men’s and women’s cross country teams took to the ground in the early morning on Nov. 10 at the 2017 NCAA Mid-Atlantic Regional Championships held at Lehigh University. The women had an excellent showing, finishing 13th as a team in a field of 28. The men finished 11th in a field of 26 teams in the 10k race.
Coming off the Atlantic-10 Championships where they finished second, the men experienced a disappointing regionals. Leading the Crimson and Gray was graduate student Dan Savage, finishing with a career-best time of 31:16.9, which was good for a 39th place finish in a field of 180 runners.
Following behind Savage was sophomore Zach Michon, who clocked in at a time of 31:30.2 in 52nd place. Senior David Dorsey finished 57th overall at 31:41.4. The Hawk’s number four and number five runners were junior Shawn Hutchinson and sophomore Josh Clark, who finished with times of 32:04.4 and 32:15.6, respectively. Both were 10k collegiate-best times.
“Sometimes with these bigger types of races we’ll go out a little slower, and with today’s weather conditions, that’s exactly what happened,” Savage explained. “After around two to three miles, the race started picking up like crazy and I guess some of us weren’t ready for the intense pickup.”
The men don’t have much time to regroup though, as they finish up their season at the IC4A Championships on Nov. 18. in the Bronx, New York at Van Cortlandt Park.
“It’s [Van Cortlandt Park]known to be a tougher course with some pretty intense hills,” Savage said. “So going into it, I think we’re going to definitely try to cap off the season as best we can and come together and try to have another performance like we did at A-10 to solidify this good year.”
As for the women, the team was able to rebound from their performance at the A-10 Championships and come out strong, with senior Cassidy Weimer posting a new personal record in the final 6k race of her career. Weimer finished with a time of 21:15.8, good for a 46th place finish in a field of 193. Junior Lucy Harmon came in as the Hawk’s number two runner with a 63rd place finish and a time of 21:33.1, also a 6k personal record.
Junior Lindsey Oremus finished 79th overall, clocking in at 21:45.5, a season-best time. Graduate student Sydney Coughlin came in 112th with a time of 22:16.6 in her final 6k race, and junior Elaine Estes finished the scoring with a time of 22:29.6.
“These past two weeks we talked about taking away from the last race something that was good or bad,” women’s Head Coach Melody O’Reilly said. “You always learn something from every race and you’re either going to do something again because you liked the way it went or you’re not going to do something again because it didn’t happen.”
Weimer felt sentimental about running the last 6k of her career.
“It was sad coming down the last 1000 knowing it was the end, but it’s been such a long season and to finally come across the line and turn around and see my teammates coming in right behind me, it was a great feeling,” Weimer said.
The women finish up their season next week at the ECAC Championships in the Bronx, New York at Van Cortlandt Park on Nov. 18.
“I hope we perform really well,” O’Reilly said. “I get to race 10 girls in the collegiate championship and then another 10 of them race in the open race. I hope we take this really positive day [Nov. 10] and carry it right into Van Cortlandt Park.”
