The cross country team kicked off its season on Friday, hosting six schools for the Lafayette Preview, with women competing in the 5K and men competing in the 6K.
Senior A.J. Sanford led the Leopards with a fifth-place finish (18:36.4) for the men’s 6K race.
“It’s about where I expected I would be,” Sanford said. “I think it was a good baseline way to establish where my fitness is at, but definitely not anything to get too hung up over. It’s just the opener and there’s a lot more work to do.”
Junior Justin Brown placed two spots behind Sanford with a seventh-place finish, coming in at 18:42.4.
“For me, specifically, I think I did exactly what I wanted to do, which was go out and give a hard effort, but feel really confident and just kind of run with my teammates and have fun with it overall,” Brown said.
In the women’s race, senior Casey MacElhiney came in 10th place at 18:22.9. Moments later, sophomore Ava Severino placed 23rd with a time of 19:03.6, followed immediately by freshman Anya Kazemi in 24th place at 19:08.9.
“I was really happy with how it went personally,” Kazemi said. “I didn’t really know what to expect going into my first college race, but I tried to not really set too many expectations for myself, especially because our home course is pretty hard.”
Junior Kira Marr followed close behind Kazemi with a 28th-place finish and a time of 19:17.1.
“I studied abroad last semester, so I was trying to figure out how to race again and I think it wasn’t my best race, but it was a good stepping stone into the rest of the season,” Marr said.
After missing her sophomore season due to injury and getting back into the swing of things during her junior year, senior Maura Timoney began her final collegiate season with a 53rd-place finish at 19:53.6.
“I think Friday, our coach wanted us to mostly focus on having fun when you’re out there, so I think that was the main thing that I was trying to work on,” Timoney said. “I was running pretty anxiously last year trying not to reinjure myself, but now I’m more confident.”
Coming off a season with a sixth-place finish from the women and a ninth-place finish from the men out of ten teams in the Patriot League Championship, the team looks to improve upon its group support throughout this season.
“I think just moving forward, the team needs to work on packing up and really working together and making sure if someone starts to fall behind, bringing them with you and supporting each other, not only after the race but throughout the race too,” Timoney said.
Cross country will race again against Lehigh at Metzgar Fields on Sept. 21.
“They have a very long unbroken streak of beating us,” Sanford said. “The goal is always to go in there and upset them.”