News

Race Results: Varsity (1st of 28) | Junior Varsity (1st of 12)
Team Split Sheet: Here
Race Photographs: Varsity | Junior Varsity

What a day we had back at Jefferson Barracks! On a brilliant, cool fall morning, the team came ready to compete, and compete at a high level. Running on the same course as we did on October 7 at the MCC Championship, times were significantly faster, nearly across the board. Of our 70 racers, 46 earned PRs and two ran season-best times. Between the two races, we claimed 19 of a possible 22 medals and two team championships.

VARSITY: Despite our rich XC tradition, "Hancock champions" was never found on our program resume until this weekend. We have been coming to this invitational, one of the oldest and historically most prestigious in the St. Louis area, since 1972. In years past, it has attracted some top teams and runners from around the bi-state region. That resume void changed on Saturday. Even with resting our top 5, varsity won the 28-team race, placing all seven runners in the top 29 overall. Will Riggan finished as our team #1, running a new PR of 17:08 for 8th place overall. Tim Greiner was right on his shoulder in 9th. Wyatt Seal, Anthony Zangara, and Charlie Murray were also close behind, finishing out an 11-second scoring spread from Will to Charlie. Also medalling and running very fine races were Francis Alford and Nolan Meara. Congratulations to this bunch for entering their names in the SLUH XC history books!

JUNIOR VARSITY: The JV squad earned another meet championship of their own, placing 12 in the top 15 and the top 9 overall. There was no freshman-only division, so this race featured 63 of our runners, accounting for about a third of the total field. Mason Scargall and Carter Lowe set the pace at the front of the race, running together for most of the race until Mason pulled away for the win. Their times of 17:14 and 17:20 are exceptional, and each would have placed around the top 15 of the varsity race. It's impossible to mention all the exceptional races, but here are but a few that stand out: Tyler Barks earning a varsity letter & navy shirt; Brendan Jones, Flynn O'Connell, Gabe Sullivan, Gus Talleur, and Charlie Gray earning varsity letters; five freshmen under 19:00 and ten under 20:00; Connor Coolbaugh running under 20:00 for the first time ever after a challenging Friday; Joel Miller with a massive season-best; the return of Clark Davis after a long time spent on the bike; Hudson Funke beating a freshman year PR; Graham Kelly & Micah Doherty running about four minutes faster than their last races at JB; and Ian Keuhner & Gabe Chambers continuing their upward trajectory. And those are just a few of the many great results from Saturday! The data are remarkable.