November 1, 2008

The weather was a perfect 55 degrees and sunny and the Engineers took advantage by defending their NEWMAC Cross Country Championship at their home course at Franklin Park. The men raced first, defending their title successfully for the 10th consecutive time, winning their 11th championship in the 11 years the conference has been in existence. By the time the women ran the temperatures had risen near 60 degrees but it did not seem to heat up as much as the course due to the women's quick pace. The lady Engineers defended their title successfully, their fourth in 11 years.

Coast Guard's men's team had defeated MIT soundly at the UMass Dartmouth Invitational early in the season and the Engineers knew the three seniors leading Coast Guard; Mike Haas, Mike Persun and Zach Hennighausen would be formidable opponents. What was not clear was how much support their teammates might be. For their part, MIT knew they had more depth, and if the pace was fast enough at the beginning, then the Tech runners would be able to take advantage and pack in the runners as the other teams fatigued.

The pace was relatively quick with the first mile a crisp 4:56. Leading the way was Kevin Jillson, a senior from WPI. Following close behind were Coast Guard's three seniors, Mike Griffin from Springfield along with a teammate of his and the top three from MIT, Jake Ruzevick, Hemu Arumugam and Yermie Cohen. About three seconds back were six more Coast Guard runners, eight MIT harriers, one Babson College runner and two of Griffin's teammates.

By mile two, MIT had made a big move and taken over the top three places with Haas and Persun right with them. Jillson had fallen back just behind Griffin. MIT put three more runners; Paul Welle, Trevor Rundell and Richard Prevost ahead of two Coast Guard runners and then the next eight of nine runners were from either MIT or Coast Guard, still making it either team's meet. By mile three the top six did not change but Griffin had begun to close on Cohen from MIT. Rundell and Welle moved up behind Griffin, and although Prevost had faded, freshman Andrew Erickson was coming on strong and had moved into 10th place. At the end of mile four it became obvious that Ruzevick was going to have a battle with Haas and Persun if he wanted to defend his individual title as all three came through at 20:38. Griffin had caught Cohen and was moving up on Arumugam. Rundell was still running strong, moving up on Cohen but Hennighausen was showing some fight as he went past Welle right at the four mile mark. Erickson fell back to 15th but Jack Bourbonnais moved up to 13th for Tech. The final mile, actually a little short of a mile, proved to be a good one for Ruzevick as he took the Coast Guard runners coming down Bear Cage Hill and sprinted to a three second victory in 25:25, defeating the other 117 runners. The places did not change much in the final mile with the exception of a strong move by Erickson moving back to 10th to earn Rookie of the Year honors, Bourbonnais moving up to 11th and Gihan Amarasiriwardena placing 13th to give MIT eight All Conference runners as they scored 28 points to 41 for Coast Guard.

The women's race played out in very similar fashion as the men's. The pace however was a bit faster, relatively speaking. Amanda DiPaulo from Springfield, one of the individual favorites to win the race, took the pace out, coming through the mile in 5:49. MIT's Jacqui Wentz had just taken the lead although there was quite a pack with her. Nora Youngs from Smith, the defending champion was there as well as Amanda Rawson and Lauren Reddy from Wheaton, last year's second and third place finishers. In addition to a couple more Smith and Springfield runners, MIT's Janice O'Brien, Tania Morimoto, Alicia Kaestli and Anna Holt-Gosselin were also at 5:49 and only a couple of seconds back were Maria Monks, Andrea Bradshaw, Elizabeth Finn and Jennifer Doyle. It was nice to see the Engineers out so fast but there was also some concern with regard to them holding the pace.

At the two mile mark, Wentz had put the hammer down and opened up a 10 second lead. Monks, running her first race of the season after recovering from a stress fracture that developed over the summer, made an aggressive move and passed DiPaulo with Reddy and Youngs closely behind. However, O'Brien, Bradshaw, Morimoto and Holt-Gosselin were in a line to solidify MIT's effort. In the third mile, en route to the 5K finish, Reddy caught DiPaulo and Monks, with Youngs passing Monks as well. However, Wentz now had a 13 second lead and Bradshaw, Katherine Eve, a freshman who moved up significantly in the third mile, Monks and O'Brien claimed fifth through eighth to close out the scoring before any other team was able to get their second runner across the line.

Wentz won with a time of 18:28 to win Runner of the Year, defeating 111 other runners, with both Bradshaw and Eve breaking 19 minutes. Eve won Rookie of the Year honors. All 15 of MIT's runners finished before any other team's fifth runner to demonstrate how strong of a race the Engineers ran. Also earning All Conference were Holt-Gosselin in 10th, Doyle in 11th and Finn in 14th.

Both the men's and women's teams will head to Williams College in two weeks for the NCAA Division III New England Regional Championship and the opportunity to represent MIT and the region at the national championships the following weekend.

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