The cross country team finished its season at the NCAA Mid-Atlantic Regional Championship at Penn State last Friday. Despite some strong individual performances, both the men’s and women’s teams finished with middling scores.
The men’s team placed 23rd out of 27 in its first and only 10k of the year with a score of 671. Senior Emil Arangala led the men’s team with an 86th-place performance out of nearly 200 runners with a final time of 31:52.4. Juniors Justin Brown and Cole Chukoskie followed close behind, placing 106th (32:08.1) and 137th (32:46.9).
“I think we did a very good job of getting out fast at the start,” Chukoskie said. “We maybe could have done a little bit better at pushing that uphill coming back at the end. That’s always a tough part.”
Freshman David Whitford cracked the Leopards’ top five with a 34:35.0 finish, providing the team with a much-needed boost in the injury-related absence of senior A.J. Sanford.
“For being the first 10K of the season, I didn’t have much expectations going into it,” Whitford said. “It got out really fast. The whole group that I was with, we went through the first mile in sub-five and just tried to hold on for the rest of the race.”
On the women’s side, the team placed 25th out of 30 with a score of 736 in the 6K. Senior Casey MacElhiney paced the women with a 22:19.0 finish, with juniors Liz Borah and Kira Marr close behind in 131st (22:34.3) and 147th (22:52.9), respectively.
Marr noted that she put together the best race of her season.
“I hadn’t been running my best the whole season, so it was really good to finish on a nice note,” she said.
The course itself played a role, with a downhill beginning and rolling hills throughout the race.
“The entire first mile was pretty much downhill, which made it really really fast, which was fun,” Marr said. “The third mile was a net uphill, which was definitely hard.”
Although the team placed in the bottom five, Marr said that she saw her personal growth as a success and was looking forward to the indoor track season.
“I studied abroad last semester, so I missed track, which made it hard coming back,” Marr said. “I think throughout the season, I’ve progressed into being able to fully come back, and I’m ready for track season this year.”