Cross Country

Running unattached and decked out in glowing lime green apparel and orange detailed shoes, junior John Simons captured the title Friday at the Oz Memorial.

 He was able to fend off teammates Adam Zutz — who was also running unattached — and Matt Volz in the final 200 meters of the race, crossing the line in 19 minutes, 19 seconds.

The Gophers men’s cross country team exerted their dominance across the nation this weekend.

Minnesota sent nine runners to compete at the Hornet Jamboree in Sacramento, Calif., and captured the top five spots at that meet.

Pieter Gagnon, Hassan Mead and Andrew Larsen finished first, second and third, respectively, all with times of 19 minutes, 28 seconds.

Erik Truedson finished fourth with a time of 19 minutes, 33 seconds and Marcus Paulson crossed in the fifth position with a time of 19 minutes, 34 seconds.

It’s tough for anyone stuck in Minneapolis and its freezing rain to have much sympathy for Gophers cross country runners competing with temperatures in the low-seventies and a little wind.
But weather conditions for the NCAA Championships on Monday in Terre Haute, Ind., weren’t ideal, especially for the snowbirds from Minnesota who’ve been training in the kind of air that burns the lungs.
Both the men’s and women’s teams finished 27th in a 31-team field, after both qualified for the race with at-large bids.

Steph Price, fresh off winning Midwest Region Athlete of the Year for cross country, will lead her team into the NCAA Championships on Monday.
The Gophers made the 31-team field as an at-large qualifier. For Price, it’s the final test in a prolific junior season highlighted by a regional championship title her last time out, just the second in team history.
But this wasn’t always the intended destination for Price.

To an extent, Ashlie Decker personifies the Gophers women’s cross country team this season. She’s young, inexperienced, relatively under the radar — and extremely talented.
Decker, a true freshman, is one of the primary members that have caused this team to exceed expectations.
Head coach Gary Wilson said it’s not a matter of over-achieving; merely a case of Decker lived up to the coach’s expectations right away.

Ben Blankenship holds the school record in the mile, and coaches have always considered him an elite middle-distance runner who also runs cross country.

Now even he doesn’t know what to think.

In what became a mad dash to the finish line, Blankenship took third in the Big Ten Championships on Halloween, finishing within a second of first place.

“Ben really may have put himself in a different level in terms of his cross country at the Big Ten meet,” head coach Steve Plasencia said, calling it the best cross country race of Blankenship’s career.

Though it certainly wasn’t the toughest field they’ve faced, the men’s cross country team recorded a perfect score in a meet against primarily Division III schools Friday.
The top nine finishers were all Minnesota runners, though four weren’t competing as Gophers to preserve a year of eligibility.
The team’s second tier of runners — those not competing in regionals next week — competed at St. John’s University against the likes of Bethel and Gustavus, with South Dakota State being the only other Division I school participating.