Cross Country Teams Battle at Franklin Park

Women's Cross Country

What's the secret to success in women's cross country? According to Coach Frank Haggerty, staying "relaxed and trying to run with as little effort as possible" is the recipe.

He tells his runners to focus on how they're racing, not to concentrate on the end result. And in Friday's 3.1 mile New England championship meet, that strategy worked.

Finishing fifth out of 37 teams at their home course in Franklin Park, the Harvard women were especially excited to beat Ivy League rival Brown.

"It was definitely the best race of the season," said captain Heather Stroud. "[Brown] beat us pretty handily a couple weeks ago, so it was great to finish ahead of them today."

Harvard's top runner of the day, junior Margaret Schotte, pushed hard at the end for a 14th place finish out of 261 runners.

"It was the first week I didn't let myself get out-kicked at the end," Schotte said.

With so many people to pass and so many strong teams in the race, the competitive atmosphere helped Harvard's women to run a fast race.

"I cut a minute and 30 seconds off my best Franklin Park time this season," said sophomore Bethany Helms, Harvard's fourth finisher.

Sophomore Kathryn Moynihan who finished third for Harvard, also had a good race, shaving 30 seconds off her personal record.

"We've raced really well as a team this year," Moynihan said.

"[The women] focused on relaxation," Haggerty said. "Stress results from fearing the consequences, and today they didn't fear the consequences, so they ran well."

The Harvard women compete again in two weeks at the Heptagonal Championships.

Men's Cross Country

Harvard men's cross country placed ninth in Friday's five-mile New England championship meet. Caught in a bottle-neck at the start of the race, the men had a slow first mile and couldn't make up the time.

"We got out too slow, and we couldn't really recover," said captain Scott Muoio. "In this big of a field it's hard to catch up when you fall back."

"Our last race at Franklin Park was small, but today we had over 200 guys on line," said sophomore David Martin. "I spent the first two miles throwing elbows, and I had to hurdle a guy who got knocked down.

"It's more mentally taxing--you can't start thinking about your race until after the first two miles."

As a team, the men ran about 20 seconds slower than they had anticipated.

"A couple of us had good races," Muoio said. "The poor times can be chocked up to conditions."

"We are forced to learn from this race," Haggerty said. "It was by far our biggest race this year, and it could have been better, but it also could have been worse."