Today, on a slightly chilly but still beautiful day out in Reno, Nevada, the UNM Men’s and Women’s Cross Country teams set out to defend several years of conference title sweeps. It was a tough course and an event filled with some very good teams in both races, so, unfortunately, the sweep streak was broken. However, while the banged-up men’s side wasn’t able to keep up with the other top teams in the conference, the women continued their streak of dominance.
After a 30 minute frost delay, the morning started with the Men’s 8k. It was clear watching the race online how difficult this course was, as there seemed to be very few flat stretches and some significant hills that the runners had to climb each lap. Most of the runners looked like they were struggling for a good chunk of the race and some of them had to be carried away after they crossed the finish line. Because of that, everyone ran at a much slower pace than they had in other events (as an example of how difficult this course was compared to previous competitions, if each Lobo had ran their same pace as the Wisconsin adidias Invitational, they would have taken the top five spots in this race by over a minute and a half.)
In the following plot, we see the results for each team that competed, with a breakdown of how they got their score from their top 5 runners. As we can see, this turned into a three team race between Air Force, Colorado State, and Boise State, with Air Force just barely edging out the other two teams for the championship. The Lobos were well behind those three and ended up pretty solidly in fifth place. Watching the race, it looked like they were fighting hard to overcome some injuries and the tough course, so hopefully they’ll be able to get back to full strength in the next couple of weeks.
The next plot shows the results for each runner that competed in the event, with the Lobo runners shown in red. As has been the recent trend, the team was fairly spread out across the field, which goes a long way towards explaining their score. Elmar Engholm (26:43.7) led the team with his strong sixth place finish and Dan Milechman (27:03.4) was just behind him, finishing in 11th. After that, the team dropped off a bit, with Graham Thomas (27:56.3) finishing in 26th, Josh Kerr (28:16.6) in 37th, Zac Castillo (29:03.3) in 47th, and Jesus Mendoza (29:23.8) in 54th. One thing that affected the team today, although I don’t know if it would have gotten them out of fifth place, was the health of Matthew Bergin, who wasn’t able to finish the race. He was clearly trying to fight through a leg injury, but with how tough the course was, that wasn’t in the cards. The team isn’t particularly deep this season, so any injuries to the top 5 runners really affects their chances at success. I hope that it’s nothing serious for Bergin and he’ll be back to form again soon.
On the women’s side, the Lobos continued to lay waste to their competition, finishing in first place with 24 points, which was well ahead of Boise State’s 71 points. They did this by having seven of the top 12 runners, which again is a testament to their tremendous depth. This win was their 8th straight conference championship and should give them a lot of confidence going into the Mountain Regional Championships.
In the plot below, we can see the results for each team and the breakdown of how they arrived at that score. These plots never stop being impressive to me, as it shows just how unusual it is for a team to have such great balanced in their scoring and such strong individual runners. The most points that any runner has contributed to their score for any event has been 12, which is kind of crazy to think about.
In the next plot, we have the results for each individual runner in the Women’s 6k, with the Lobos shown in red. As we’ve seen out of them before, there is a large group of red bars towards the front, but it’s also worth pointing out that the Lobos actually ran nine in this event, and all of them finished in the top 30. Courtney Frerichs (22:05.2) picked up the silver medal for the conference, behind only Boise’s Allie Ostrander, who is the top runner nationally. Behind Frerichs, Alice Wright (22:24.4), Rhona Auckland (22:40.0), Molly Renfer (22:54.0), Calli Thackery (22:55.1), and Heleene Tambet (22:55.5) finished fourth through eighth and Emily Hosker-Thornhill (23.32.0) came in 12th. Sophie Connor (24:26.8) and Natasha Bernal (24.41.7) rounded out the team with their 26th and 30th place finishes, respectively. All in all, just another great performance by all of the women.
The teams will next be competing in the Mountain Regional Championship, which will be held here at the UNM North Golf Course in a couple of weeks and I encourage everyone to show up and cheer these teams on. Hopefully, the men will be able to heal up and bounce back for that event and the women will be able to keep their run of impressive performances going.