BY DAN GEYER, CONTRIBUTING WRITER
Last weekend, the St. Bonaventure men’s and women’s cross country teams competed in their second meet of the year in the Harry F. Anderson Invitational hosted by Roberts Wesleyan College on Sept. 24.
The women’s team finished third out of fifteen teams, finishing behind Roberts Wesleyan by eight points and Geneseo by 68 points.
The men’s team finished fourth of 15, placing behind Geneseo by 87 points, Cortland by 14 points and Roberts Wesleyan, the host of the meet, by just one point.
On the men’s side, sophomore Clay Peets continued his start, breaking another school record, breaking William Delaney’s 8K record by ten seconds, finishing fourth overall in the meet with a time of 25:26.2, This is the second school record Peets had broken in as many weeks, after breaking the 5k record in the Little Three meet back on Sept. 3.
Other notable finishers included senior Darion Gregory, 29th, 26:35.0, setting a personal record and moving into 8th place in school history in terms of individual records, freshman Aiden Scattergood, 30th, 26:36.6, freshman Alex Ryan, 32nd, 26:42.6, sophomore Colin McCarthy,44th, 27:04.3 and sophomore James Fitzmaurice, 45th, 27:11.1 The men’s race featured a total of 174 competitors.
“Both teams did well,’ said Bonnies coach Bob MacFarlane. “The men were one point out of third place. They ran well, we had 15 personal records, the kids did well and ran well. One thing we did see is most kids followed their race plan to a t which contributes to that they are following the process that we have set for them. We are backending our schedule, focusing more on training and then racing and we hope that continues, we feel the training is being done very well.”
On Clay Peets second school record, MacFarlane went on to say that “[Clay] Peets is very acute to the training, he knows his body very well. We meet with the kids individually, they have a lot in the sense of their mileage, they know their bodies ,he understands his runner, he is very focused, laid back in a sense that he will be within the top 5 or top 10 the first part of the race, he understands what needs to be done.”
MacFarlane added that Peets “does aqua jogging and is learning to take care of his body. Eating right, getting the right amount of sleep etc. He got really sick during cross country last season and put a damper on his performance in the A10s but I’m very impressed with how he has performed so far.”
In terms of qualifying for the Atlantic 10 championships, MacFarlane said that “we have nine guys and seven girls that have qualified for A-10s, our goal is ten but we would like to see more than that. Each runner has a running plan we set and many stick to that plan and have seen improvement from race to race.”
In describing the cross country course at Roberts Wesleyan, MacFarlane stated that “The course in Rochester was beautiful and good for running. All variables came to fruition and makes it easier to set a [PR]. The next course can be very good but you don’t know the weather conditions. We have some guys out sick but we go with the intention to improve their times and focus on ourselves.”
On the women’s side, it was freshman Jenna Gregory, Darion’s sister, pacing the way, finishing 12th in the 5k with a time of 18:59.6, out of 168 total competitors and over two seconds from her personal best she set in the Little Three Championship on Sept. 3.
Other notable finishers included freshman Mia Winters, 16th, 19:11.6 and is now 11th in the individual record books, freshman Claire Cuneo,17th, 19.12.8, freshman Molly Gipson, 33rd, 19:42.4, junior Emily Peterson, 41st, 20:04.2, freshman Faith Caldwell, 48th, 20:16.9 and junior Lauren Magee, finishing just outside the top 50 in 51st place with a time of 20:21.5.
The men’s team will compete this Saturday in the Mike Woods Invitational hosted by Geneseo College Oct. 1, while the women’s team will compete on Oct 8 at the Carnegie Mellon Invitational before competing in the JennaStrong Fall Classic on Oct 15 in Wilmington, Ohio.
“The meet in two weeks will have over 40 teams and is a true cross country course, with woods, rivers etc.” Coach MacFarlane said. “We’ll see all of the big schools from that area. The competition gets harder but we build our schedule this way to prepare them for the true test which is A-10s and we want them to have their best race at the A-10 championships.”
geyerd18@bonaventure.edu
