Re-cap of NCAA Pre-Nationals

Men-
Unfortunately, this was not one of our better days from a team perspective. We got out a little too slow and stayed buried for most of the race. I take a lot of the blame for this because I told them to go out conservatively on the sloppy, slow course. I would say that the course was roughly 40-50 seconds slower than it has been in the past due to all the rain and mud. Some of the guys did run well, but several of them had "off" days. Blake Johnson was our top runner and he passed about 70 guys during the race, but he should have been further up in the race to begin with. Some positives: in the last two years, we have never had our 5th man place higher than 229th. Peter Bolgert was our 5th man yesterday placing 198th. I haven't looked too much into the history of Marquette competing at Pre-Nationals, but I'm not sure we've ever finished in the top 25. I think that yesterday was an "off" day and we were still able to place 30th. All of these guys are very young and they will get a few more cracks at this meet. Overall, I think this was a good learning experience for them and I think we'll run better at conference after having competed in this meet. Here's how things unfolded for each runner:

155. Blake Johnson (25:51)- solid race, but he just got out too slow. Needs to do a better job of putting himself in the race. Placed 203rd in this race last year, so at least he made a nice improvement.
170. Brice Cleland (25:59)- not a bad race for him, but not a great race either. Still nowhere near the fitness level that he was at last year. Not sure what the deal is....
187. Nick Szczech (26:09)- I don't really want to get into it. Not good....
194. Connor Callahan (26:12)- Solid race for this freshman, although he had way too much left at the finish. Like Blake, he needs to do a better job of putting himself in the race.
198. Peter Bolgert (26:21)- Solid race for Peter. Peter always goes 100%. If he's in the race, you know he'll give it everything he's got.
204. Dominick Rosario (26:28)- Great race for this sophomore. He's made some tremendous improvements since last season. Couldn't be happier with his progress.
219. Patrick Keeley (26:57)- Tough day for this sophomore. Got out slow and stayed pretty slow.

Open race-
52. Keith Schueller (26:45)- Much better effort for this sophomore. Earned his spot on the conference squad.
84. Anthony Gedwill (27:41)- Very happy with this freshman. He also earned his spot on the conference squad. He was not one of the superstars that we brought in, but he's healthy and producing results while the other guys are sitting at home. He came in ready to go!
92. Patrick Maag (27:55)- This freshman has really been through a lot recently and he ended his season on a positive note today. He was very sick for about two weeks earlier this season. He is much better on the track and all the fitness he gained this XC season will come back to help him.

Women-
I felt like the women competed much better than they did at Wisconsin a few weeks ago. Again, the course was very sloppy and slow and our women came through the 5k at times that weren't too far off of what they ran at Wisconsin for just 5k. Jayne had a nice race finishing in 83rd place. I would have liked Anna and Olivia to be a little closer to Jayne, but overall they had decent performances. I was slightly confused with the outcome of this years race. Last year, our top two women dropped out of the race and we finished 26th. This year, we had a fairly solid performance all-around and we place 29th. It just goes to show you that you can never predict the outcome of any race. I do believe that several of these women are on an upswing and I think all of them will be ready for their best race of the year at the conference meet on Oct. 31st. Here's how things played out:

83. Jayne Grebinski (21:55)- Solid performance for Jayne. She moved up through the race well.
148. Anna Weber (22:37)- Too much time/places between our #1 and #2 runners. Anna is better than this.
154. Olivia Johnson (22:41)- Considering she walked the last 400m of this race last year, I'll take her performance. She's better than this, but I'll take what I can get.
165. Kristin Pelzel (22:48)- Nice race for this young lady. She usually bombs at the bigger meets, so hopefully this is a turning point. She was in dead-last at 400m of this particular race, worked her way up nicely.
170. Molly Arenberg (22:52)- She's a soccer player, how can I not be happy with the way she's running this season. She just runs and has fun! Very refreshing.
185. Laurie Dalrymple (23:06)- She's lucky to even be running right now. Spent two days in the hospital about two weeks ago. Missed the Wisconsin meet. She might be in our top 5 at conference, she might not race. Your guess is as good as mine.
198. Sarah Verdoliva (23:17)- Solid race for her, but still not quite where I think she should be running. Might be starting to run out of gas. First full season of XC. Hopefully all of this XC stuff will help her in track. We'll see....

Open Race-
17. Amanda Beggs (22:54)- Great race for this senior. Still not running where she was last year, but she has made steady progress throughout the season. I think she'll make a run at our top 5 at conference.
60. Christina Sliepka (23:46)- Solid effort for this freshmen. Good way for her to end her season.
63. Carly Condon (23:52)- Great effort for this young lady. She is a red-shirt freshmen and she has absolutely no idea whats going on around her. She's another one who just shows up and races. She has possibly the most potential for improvement.
72. Carly Windt (24:08)- Not a good race for her. She ran awesome at UW-Parkside last weekend, so this was frustrating. Oh well, she made some tremendous improvements this year and I'm pleased with here progress.