Men, women turn in strong performances

The women's cross country team raced to the top this past weekend, leaving both Harvard and Yale in the dust at the annual H-Y-P meet. The Tigers' domination of the meet ended with Princeton scoring only 20 points, and Yale and Harvard at 43 and 85, respectively. After the win over rivals Iona and Villanova at the Princeton Invitational two weeks earlier, the Tigers continued their season-opening win streak.

Though Princeton entered the race as the favorite, the Bulldogs — a perennially strong team — were expected to challenge the Tigers with nose-to-nose finishes. Though the Bulldogs successfully nabbed first individual place, they struggled to defeat the Tigers' depth. The Tigers finished in groups and capped the meet by producing 14 of the first 20 finishers, including spots two through eight.

"Running in a group of either your competitors or teammates obviously makes the race much easier so [Coach Peter Farrell] often encourages group running, especially in the early season meets," senior Mia Swenson said. "It can be a difficult strategy to execute, but so far the team has done a good job staying together, especially in the early parts of the race."

Swenson helped lead the team to victory this past weekend. Trailing race winner Lindsay Donaldson of Yale at the finish line by only five seconds, Swenson completed the five-kilometer course at an impressive 17 minutes, 31 seconds, and was the leader of the first block of Tigers to finish the race, many of whom were freshmen.

"The freshman class has done a fantastic job of immediately making an impact on the team," Swenson said.

Following Swenson's lead, the freshmen proved to be one of the strongest classes by taking the next finishes. Christy Johnson and Liz Costello took third and fourth respectively at 17:46 and 17:49. Reilly Kiernan — moving up five spots within the team — and Alexa Glencer followed, finishing sixth and seventh, with only senior Catha Mullen breaking the chain of frosh, finishing fifth.

The men's cross country team had similar success this past weekend. With only a handful of athletes traveling to Falcon Heights, Minn., to compete at the competitive Roy Griak Invitational, Princeton finished seventh out of 34 teams. With over 300 runners present, 10 teams ranked in the top 30 nationally and nine teams that reached the NCAA championship meet last year, the invitational was a challenge and a unique experience for many of the Tigers. With poor weather conditions and a tough course, Princeton struggled but still came out near the top.

"Going in, we really had no idea what to expect," sophomore Brett Campfield said. "We had run one small race earlier on our home course, which went well, but we didn't really have to test ourselves."

The team experienced both ups and downs this past weekend. Sophomore Michael Maag, the first Princeton finisher and 17th overall, completed the 8K course in 25:05.2, an average of 5:03 per mile.

After finishing as Princeton's top runner at the Princeton Invitational two weeks earlier, Campfield once again delivered a strong performance, running a 5:09 pace and finishing 36th overall. Junior Frank Tinney, senior Paul Rosa and junior James O'Toole were the final Princeton scorers, placing 56th, 82nd and 84th, respectively.

One of the team's best runners, junior Dave Nightingale, was unable to finish the race after completing approximately three-fourths of the course.

But Princeton put up a performance which was an indicator of the team's current strength.

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"Nobody ran out of their mind, and a couple of guys did not run where their fitness should put them. But that's why we do these big early-season meets, to work out the kinks for when it really counts," Maag said. "We have plenty of room for improvement ... there is a good vibe among the team about what we can accomplish not only at Heps, but also at the regional and national meets in November."