The Men’s Cross Country team’s season is winding down. The team has three meets left, the Jim Drews Invitational at UW-La Crosse, the MIAC Championships and the NCAA Central Regional meet.

The team is excited for these next few meets. “The big meets are coming up, the ones we train six months of the year for,” Junior Mark Bartley said.

“The MIAC meet is always a fast one. We could do a lot better than people are expecting us to do if a couple guys take a chance,” Junior Anders Bowman said. “We hope to pull up a couple guys to run faster.”
So far this season, the Men’s team has had mixed results. In the last meet, the Dan Huston Invitational in Waverly, Iowa, the team placed 20th out of 25 teams. However, at the previous meet, the Roy Griak Invitational at the University of Minnesota, the team placed better: 12th out of 30 teams.

The Dan Huston Invitational was not the team’s best showing, since several runners did not compete, including Bowman and Senior Nick Ross, who are two of the team’s top runners. In addition, the nearly 90 degree weather in Iowa made for difficult conditions.

“Last weekend’s meet went pretty well, considering the warm weather,” Senior Jeremy Kuhn said.

On the positive side, the Griak Invitational at the end of September went better than in past years. “We placed better at the Griak Invitational that we have in a long time,” Bowman said.

Over the course of the season, the team’s core runners have done well, but it has had trouble improving as a whole. “The front guys have run fast starting relatively early in the season. For us to improve, we need more guys to take a chance and run fast,” Bowman said.

Despite the mixed results score-wise, the team feels it works well together. “We have a very tight team—we have bonded well together,” Bartley said. “We also have a smarter approach to training this year, and I think experience helps with that.

The runners’ performance, according to team members, is better than it has been in past years. “This is my last year on the team, since I’m a senior. This team, in terms of the number of solid performers, is the best top-to-bottom that I have been on. The [team] is grouped close together in the race, which helps at meets like Conference and Regionals,” Kuhn said.

The team still has hopes for the end of the season. “If we put the pieces of the puzzle together, we could run really fast,” Bowman said.