2012 Men's Cross Country Season Snap Shot
2012 Season Review: With two solid runners returning to lead the squad, Coach Brunger was eager to lead the men’s cross country team to the next level this fall. Several spring-sport athletes joined the team as an avenue to improve their fitness and to test their mental toughness with long runs. After a strong start to the season, injuries began to take their toll on the team, and training routines changed to help carry the Hawks to the AMCC Championships.
Junior
Matt Williams paced Hilbert all season leading the charge four of the five races he competed in. The 31:46 ran at the Harry F. Anderson race was his career personal best and it was the only race he didn’t finish as the first Hawk runner this year. Sophomore
John Sadowski picked up right where he left off last fall with competitive times and a good kick. Unfortunately a shin injury pained him to the sideline to support his teammates the last three weeks of the season.
Giving the team a big lift was freshman
Joshua Walczuk. He challenged Williams every step of the course and snuck by him with a two-second victory at the Harry F. Anderson race (31:44) September 29th. Walczuk was a serious runner and trained hard every day with Williams using each other as motivation for improvement.
Four spring (two baseball, one volleyball, and one lacrosse) athlete trained this fall in ways they have never trained before. They ran further distances and endured weather conditions they expected to face in the start of their outdoor spring season. Baseball pitchers
Tyler Roth (35:15) and
Andrew Cartaginese (39:39) earned personal best times early in the season.
Rick Landahl, who runs the midfield on the lacrosse team, ran his personal best 36:58 two races into the season and
Steve Phillips, the Hawks setter on the volleyball team, competed for the first time in late- October running his 44:54 just before the AMCC Championships.
Also competing were two more athletes from opposite ends of the running spectrum. Senior
Kyle Kreigbaum is an accomplished marathoner who joined the team so he could drop down in distance and learn to pick up his pace in the shorter 6K races. He was a consistent runner covering the course in thirty-six minutes three of his four races. Putting down the football and just lacing up his running shoes was freshman
Akeem Todd. He worked hard and took to the running routine, posting his personal best of 45:17 in October.
Coaches Brunger and Lisa Arnst are eager for the runners to maintain their training schedule in the off-season. The coaches have a solid base of returning runners for next fall and will continue to recruit dedicated harriers to the program.