Colorado State cross country wrapped up its regular season Oct. 17 at the pre-nationals invite meet and now look ahead to the Mountain West Championship Friday.
The women notched No. 15 at the pre-national invite and look to continue their success into the MW tournament, which is a historically important event to the program.
Head coach Kelly Hart, who is in her third season as head coach, stressed the significance of the meet.
“The conference meet, more than any meet this season, is the top race,” Hart said. “Emotionally, it’s a meet that means a lot to our team, and I think that even though we’re a young team, that’s really been conveyed. The freshmen understand that the conference meet is special. It’s a meet where you’re able to dig that much harder at the end because you really care about your team.”
The team this year is young, with 12 freshmen on the team and five suiting up and competing at these big races. This allows an opportunity for everyone to step up as leaders in a way that not many cross country teams have.
“A big theme on our team is not having captains,” Hart said. ”We want everyone to feel like they can be a leader, and it’s not restricted to just people who are the oldest on the team. So, we will want people to be stepping up in leadership, whether they’re a freshman, sophomore, junior or senior.”
Tatum Berg and Parker Westermann, who are both first-years and each won MW Freshman of the Week Oct. 7. It was Berg’s second time claiming that feat this year.
“I think I have a lot more on the table than what I’ve had to show already, but I think it’s a great start of the season,” Berg said.
Berg and the rest of the girls’ team are looking to continue their success together at the Championship, using teamwork as they have all season.
“I think a really good team goal for us is just to be able to work together as a team and just pack up right away,” Berg said.
At the team’s last meet, the women saw their top five runners all finish within eight seconds of each other, a common occurrence on the season for the women. They focus on running in packs, and with the Mountain West Championship being a big meet, they look to continue this strategy.
Coach Hart wants them to use this to their advantage and continue to ascend at the championship.
“Our next challenge is just how do we get our packs that work super well together to be further up in races and be attacking and be more confident,” Hart said.
On the men’s side, the season has seen its fair share of adversity. Westermann has stepped up as a top runner after injuries and illnesses have hurt the team.
“Every day is just one day closer than what we like to say,” Westermann said. “We’re still just believing that we’re a top program team in that we’re just going to keep training as if nothing’s happened.”
The team looks to be resilient and continue to fight through the challenges of the year. They will get a boost at the championship, as senior Ryan Schumacher is in line to make his Rams debut. Schumacher has not run all year after having multiple top 10 finishes last year at his previous school, Notre Dame.
Fighting through these struggles is something that Hart believes her whole team thrives at, crediting their ability to do that to the team’s chemistry.
“They’re super motivated by each other,” Hart said. “Their underlying reason they want to be successful and want to train hard and compete is because they just really care about their teammates. I think that helps us a lot through some of the adversity of this season, is at the end of the day, they’re like: I just love being around my teammates and love working with them.”
The ability to use teamwork has shown, and Westermann said he is excited for the meet.
“We’ve had great workouts the past couple of weeks, (and) I think we kind of can replicate those group team workouts and just put that into a race form,” Westermann said. “If we can just be together, race together, then I think we’re going to have a great day.”
The men’s race begins at 10 a.m. MST, followed by the women’s at 10:45 a.m. at Woodward Park in Fresno, California and will be available to watch on Mountain West Network. The team may continue after the meet, with the NCAA Mountain Region Championship Nov. 14 and the NCAA National Championship Nov. 22, pending qualification.
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