NC State cross country got off to a fantastic start to its season with great performances from both the men’s and women’s squads at the Adidas XC Challenge in Cary on Friday, Sept. 17.
The women’s squad dominated, managing a first-place finish behind a 15-point performance while the men fell just shy of the No. 1 spot, finishing No. 2 amongst the competing teams with 47 points.
The victory for the women’s squad came in the same week as the team’s first-ever No.1 ranking in the USTFCCCA’s poll. The Pack wasted no time in proving why it deserved recognition as the country’s best, with the women’s squad absolutely dominating the competition. Sophomore Katelyn Tuohy paced all runners, finishing first in the women’s 5000-meter race with a time of 16:29.6. Multiple members of her squad weren’t far behind, with all of the top-six times in the contest belonging to members of the Pack.
The Pack women maintained a sub-17 minute average for the competition, with a total time of 1:23:18.10.
The men’s squad, while not as dominant as the women’s team, still put up an admirable performance in its first showing of the season. Finishing second in total points with 47, the team finished just over 50 seconds slower than first-placed UNC’s total time of 1:30:00.70. While UNC would finish 16 points clear of the Pack, the men’s squad made it clear that it’s here to compete for the ACC’s crown, alongside the women’s team this season.
The top performer for the Pack men’s squad was sophomore Brett Gardner, who finished the 6000-meter run in 17:54.0. The time was good enough to land him a third-place finish, just 0.6 of a second faster than his teammate, graduate student JP Flavin. The men’s team boasted four runners inside of the top-15 finishers, good enough for the second-most behind UNC’s five.
Both teams hope to build off of their impressive performances in their next outing in South Bend, Indiana, where the Pack competes in the Joe Piane Invitational. The event is scheduled to take place on Friday, Oct. 1, and will be a fantastic opportunity for each team to continue to prove why it is one of the premier programs in the conference.
