Track News Winter 2015

Track & Field and Cross Country News

winter 2015

NOTE FROM THE ASSOCIATION

W

hat an exciting fall it has been for the men and women of Yale Cross Country – who both posted some of their best team and individual performances in recent history. You can read more detail about the season in Shoe’s season wrap-up included in this newsletter.

Your participation in this association and the support network you provide for the program have been equally impressive over the past year.

Gifts made by generous alumni and friends of the program have allowed the team to compete in program-changing national meets; purchase critical training equipment; and travel out-of-region to both California for spring training and Oxford-Cambridge for a piece of Yale TF & XC tradition.

This year we are tasked with helping to raise $90,000 in annual funds to balance support from the University and endowments, all of which help our teams continue to compete. Please take a moment to make your gift to Yale TF & XC today by visiting giving.yale.edu and following the instructions below or by sending a check to Yale Track Association PO Box 1844 New Haven, CT 06520.

The strength of this association is an incredible testament to the connection our community feels to the current athletes and proud tradition of our program – thank you in advance for continuing to support Yale Track and Field and XC. Sincerely, Larry Kreider ’69

Kim Fulton, ‘91

Thank You Louisa Gerritz Garry The Yale Track and Field and Cross Country Board would like to thank Louisa Gerritz Garry ’87 for her incredible contributions to both the association and the athletes of the Yale Track and Field and Cross Country programs. As the co-president of the Association Board for many years, she has led the charge raising funds, planning events, and connecting the alumni, athletes, friends and supports of Yale. Louisa will remain on the board of directors and we look forward to her continued good work on behalf of us all.

Thank you, Louisa!

COACH’S UPDATE 2015 Hello Yale Track and Field!

I

t’s hard to believe how quickly the year goes past, but what an exciting first semester it’s been! Hard to imagine that we are finished with classes and are heading into final exams and the winter break.

It was a landmark fall for both our men’s and women’s cross country programs, as we made some major headway toward our team goals of winning Heptagonal Championships and earning national rankings.

We saw steady improvement in both teams as the season progressed, and had our most successful Cross Country Heps in a generation.

The year began as it always does for our distance and middle distance athletes; packing their sleeping bags and heading off to camp in the woods of Connecticut for some quality bonding, goal setting and training. Both teams set high standards and agreed to commit to a training plan and lifestyle that would allow them to reach their goals of finishing at, or near, the top of the league and giving themselves a good opportunity to qualify as a team for the NCAA Championships.

Our first meet was a bit of a disappointment, as the women were bested by our biggest rivals in the annual HYP meet, while the men were beaten by Princeton, and managed to eke out a win against Harvard.

That day in Boston served as a bit of an eye-opener, but panic never set in amongst either the coaching staff or the team. We simply took stock of where we were in our training and re-dedicated ourselves to the process of getting better every single day.

This year, through your generous support, we were able to add a new and challenging meet to our schedule at the University of Virginia Panorama Farms Invitational during the last weekend of September.

We got a glimpse of where we stood against national competition, and everyone was pleased with the result. Both the men and women finished in 4th place against a nationally competitive field. We began to see a quality and depth that had been missing in recent seasons and confidence began to grow after our trip to Charlottesville. Such “out of region” opportunities are possible only through the donations of our alums and friends, and this meet proved to be a huge confidence boost for our runners.

mores Adam Houston, Cameron Stanish and Senior Duncan Tomlin rounded out our top 5 at Heps. All of them finished in the top 30 of one of the most competitive races in recent memory.

Our women entered the race knowing that our strong pack and team depth would play a big factor in our team success. Our women were poised as the front runners and went out hard in the first mile. Our plan was to make moves on the famous “back hills” of Van Cortlandt which can often prove pivotal. We did just that and showed the same team depth that we had all season, running to an exciting 2nd place team finish! Junior Frances Schmeide led the way with a 7th place (1st team All-Ivy) finish, followed closely by Sophomore Dana Klein in 8th (2nd team All-Ivy). Sophomore Kelly Reagan, Frosh Ellie Atkinson and Junior Meredith Rizzo rounded out the top five. The future is very bright for this group as the entire top 7 return next year!

We entered the NCAA regional championships buoyed by our strong performance at the Heps (and a national ranking of 29 for our women!), but knew that qualifying for the NCAA was not completely within our control. If we could not finish in the top two, many chips had to fall our way in order to make it to Louisville. Alas both teams had strong performances, but we were not able to reach our team goals of qualifying for the NCAA. Frances Schmeide, Dana Klein, Meredith Rizzo, James Randon and Kevin Dooney all earned NCAA All-Region Honors. Dooney’s 7th place finish was good enough to earn him a trip to Louisville as an individual NCAA qualifier for the third straight year!

Dooney put the wraps on one of the greatest careers in the history of Yale Cross Country at the NCAA Championship in Louisville. He took the race out hard and made the attempt to run with the race leaders, but the early fast pace took its toll. He just missed earning his second consecutive All-American honor, but as always, he gave it his very best effort.

Now, we turn to the track! With the season opening meet under our belts, we now turn our attention to final exams and the winter break.

The Cross Country teams have set a high bar -- and I am very excited to see what the indoor and outdoor seasons bring!

Our next major test came in Louisville, Kentucky at the Pre-National Invitational. The meet serves as a preview of the NCAA Championships Course for our runners, and also gives us a chance to compete against the best teams from around the nation. Our men managed a 19th place finish despite what we knew was not our best team effort (our team spread from 1 – 5 was over a minute) while the women continued to come into their own finishing 14th and beating some very good teams (our team 1 – 5 spread was less than 20 seconds!).

As with every season, the Heptagonal Championships is the focus for our team. We know that success at the Ivy level will mean success on the national stage. The Ivy League has become widely regarded as a “power 5” conference in the sport of Cross Country. Both the men’s and women’s races looked wide open, and we knew that if we put it all together we could have a great result. The fact that the race was taking place at the venerable Van Cortlandt Park course added to our pre-race excitement. Neither team disappointed as the men ran to an exciting 3rd place finish behind Columbia and Penn. The team race was incredibly close; we finished 10 points outside of winning the whole thing, and made up more than thirty points on the top teams during the last 1000m of the 8k run. Senior Captain Kevin Dooney finished 2nd overall (his third consecutive All-Ivy Cross Country Award) while Junior James Randon finished 5th (also earning first team All-Ivy). Sopho-

HARKINS, TOMLIN

2015 MEN’S HEPS START

ATKINSON, MASTERSON, REAGAN, WALIGURSKI

POST RACE HUGS

SCHMIEDE, KLEIN FINISH

TRACK AND FIELD SCHEDULE

Jan 9, 2016 Jan 23, 2016 Jan 29, 2016

Yale Collegiate Invite, New Haven, CT at Columbia, Dartmouth Hanover, NH at Harvard, Princeton New York, NY

Apr 8, 2016 Apr 9, 2016 Apr 16, 2016

at Sam Howell Distance Night, Princeton, N.J. Mark Young InvitaƟonal, New Haven, CT Harvard, New Haven, Conn.

Apr 28-30, 2016

at Penn Relays, Philadelphia, PA

May 26-28, 2016 at NCAA East Preliminaries, Jacksonville, FL Jun 8-11, 2016 at NCAA Champ Championships, pionship ps, Eug Eugene, gene, OR

Save the Date Annual Track & Field and Cross Country Dinner Friday, April 1 Yale Club New York Formal InvitaƟon to Follow