Saint John's University Cross Country Blog
Cross country season will be here before we know it. The guys are getting after it now in summer training, and with five of our top seven from last year coming back plus 15:10 5000m man Eamon Cavanaugh, who missed most of cross country last year with a stress fracture, we are looking forward to a great fall. Last year’s graduating seniors will be hard to replace, but I am excited to get into the season and wanted to reach out to you with some upcoming dates to add to your calendar. There may even be some bonus highlight pictures from last year’s cross country banquet at the end of this post since I never posted those last year. Hope to see you on September 6th and on October 5th, and I will be in touch in a week or two with another blog post that will likely contain an apparel order form if you are interested in purchasing any SJU cross country apparel. Hope you’re having a great summer!
-Maxwell
Thank you to those of you who made it out to our NCAA North Region meet in Colfax, Wis. last week! The course was in great shape, and a little sleet during the race never hurt anybody. Overall, I think it was our best race of the season as a team. Obviously it is hard to go seven for seven, but I’d say that five or six of our guys had their best races of the season, with freshmen Cole Stencel having an off-day with a side cramp around 3k in. As a team, we ran better than at conference two weeks ago. Obviously missing two guys from our top five, Carter Grove and Eamon Cavanaugh, hurts as well. There is no doubt that Division III is better than ever, and we’d like to think our region is the toughest, or close to the toughest, region in the country. Here is how we finished:
Well, shoot. I definitely meant to do more of these blog posts this fall. Turns out the to-do list gets pretty long in the thick of cross country season. Maybe I should be delegating more work to our volunteer assistant coach? Nevertheless, all of the sudden it is almost the middle of November! Our top seven will toe the starting line tomorrow at Noon for the NCAA North Region Championships at Whitetail Golf Course in Colfax, Wisconsin, hosted by UW Eau Claire. Before going any further, an overdue thank you is in store to all of you for the support during our Go Johnnies Challenge earlier this season. It may sound cliché, but we literally could not do what we do without your support each year, and I am very thankful to have such a generous alumni group behind us. In an effort to keep this blog post a manageable length, I plan to put out another post early next week with a Regionals race recap, as well as some highlights from our trip earlier this season to the Division III Pre-National meet in Pennsylvania and some more info on an exciting new addition to our facilities – a LightSpeed Lift anti-gravity / body support treadmill system to aid us in injury prevention and rehabilitation. Both of those things wouldn’t have been possible for us without your support each year in the Go Johnnies Challenge!
2023 Division III Pre-Nationals Meet in Newville, Pennsylvania
Left to right: Aiden Chalmers, Cole Stencel, Nick St. Peter, Max McCoy, Joe Gathje, Lloyd Young, Tommy Allen, Eamon Cavanaugh, Vincent Kaluza, Dylan Bartness
Anyways, it has been an eventful fall full of ups and downs, just like any other season. We placed 4th two weeks ago at the MIAC Championships without two returners from last year’s top five due to injuries – 8:59 steeplechaser Carter Grove (Osakis) and 15:11 5,000m man Eamon Cavanaugh (Oak Park-River Forest, Ill.). While it goes without saying that Carter and Eamon were missed and we’re looking forward to seeing them back in action during the track season, our guys rose to the occasion and executed a great race. It’s been especially exciting to see our freshmen trio of Vincent Kaluza (Rocori), Cole Stencel (Maple River) and Max McCoy (Mt. Michael, Neb.) get better and better with each race this fall. Senior Lloyd Young earned his third consecutive All-MIAC honor, and all but 9 of our guys recorded career personal bests on a Carleton course that is not particularly easy, with three more recording season bests and all but two running faster than they did on this same course at Carleton’s Running of the Cows meet earlier this season.
Our seven competitors for the Region meet tomorrow are as follows:
Tommy Allen – Senior, St. Paul Academy
Aiden Chalmers – Sophomore, Minnetonka
Vincent Kaluza – Freshman, Rocori
Max McCoy – Freshman, Mount Michael Benedictine (Neb.)
Nick St. Peter – Sophomore, Maple Grove
Cole Stencel – Freshman, Maple River
Lloyd Young – Senior, Bloomington Kennedy
Dylan Bartness (Junior, Robbinsdale Armstrong), Jacob Malecha (Sophomore, New Prague) and Ethan Leonard (Junior, Chaska) will also be serving as our three alternates after coming across the line as the first three SJU finishers at last week’s Fall Finale on campus. The Region meet is the meet we’ve had our eye on all year, and we still feel as though our best team race is yet to come.
I don’t believe there is a live stream of the race, but you can follow the live splits of the race via Wayzata Results here: https://results.wayzatatiming.com/meets/28768
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results.wayzatatiming.com
. The women’s race is just after ours at 1:00PM, with CSB’s team looking very strong and last year’s NCAA cross country runner-up and CSB senior Fiona Smith looking to defend her two consecutive North Region titles from 2021 and 2022. For anyone planning to come watch in person, I look forward to seeing you there! Come say Hello after the race.
More, including a St. Michael’s Games update, to come next week. Because I know that is the real reason everyone reads this blog!
Maxwell & Tim
SAINT MICHAEL’S GAME UPDATE
The first two weeks of the season have been warm and busy, but that hasn’t prevented us from kicking off the 2023 St. Michael’s Games with two new events: a watermelon eating contest and a canoe relay race to the chapel and back on Lake Sag. This year’s roster was split into five St. Michael’s Games teams of seven guys each – three from each team were delegated as “eaters” and participated in the watermelon eating contest, and the other four were designated as their team’s paddlers for the canoe relay.
The watermelon eating contest proved to be a slam dunk event for some teams, and a real challenge for others. Each team drew a number out of a hat to determine which of the five watermelons they got as well as which of the five knife options from my wife and I’s house they got to use. Team Coffey Beans, with their three eaters of Joe Coffey (Kimberly, WI), Vincent Kaluza (Rocori) and Aidan Thomas (Totino-Grace) ran away with the inaugural title, finishing their watermelon in a blistering time of 5 minutes and 27 seconds. The Flying Clutchmen – Mason Allen (Park) Aaron Freier (Red Wing) and Lars Molenkamp (Almere, Netherlands) – were not far behind in 2nd with a time of 6:01. Then it got ugly. The 3rd and 4th place teams scratched and clawed, or should I say chewed, their way to finishing times of 11:58 and 16:14, with our 5th place team of Dylan Bartness (Robbinsdale Armstrong.), Danny Kloeppner (Champlin Park) and Peyton Martinek (Coon Rapids) registering as a DNF as they were unable to finish their watermelon. Tim and I applauded their effort but were disappointed in their result after so much smack talk.
The canoe relay took place this past Saturday at Lake Sag, with freshmen Peyton Martinek, fresh off his team’s DNF in the watermelon eating contest, serving as our official lifeguard for the competition to boost his student employment hours as a beach and pool lifeguard. Utilizing the campus’ free canoe rental system at Lake Sag, the four members of each St. Michael’s Game team who did not participate in the watermelon eating contest served as their team’s paddlers, with a few exceptions due to sickness. Each team’s first two paddlers started at the beach at Lake Sag and paddled out to the chapel where their other two teammates were waiting to switch places with them before paddling back to the beach. The race started off in pure disaster, as all five teams collided together while trying to get in and launch their canoes, sending several teams into a panic. Los Comodores’ first two paddlers in particular – Nate Courchane (Park) and Max McCoy (Mount Michael, NE) – had a very tough time as they instantly flipped their canoe, causing a large amount of water to get inside. After attempting to bail the water out by hand and flipping the canoe a second time, they decided to swim their canoe over to the floating raft in the lake and try to pull their canoe up before pouring all the water out… needless to say, Nate and Max got off to a poor start and really hampered their teams chances, leaving their relay teammates Eamon Cavanaugh (Oak Park-River Forest, IL) and Lloyd Young (Bloomington Kennedy), who were out at the chapel waiting for their time to shine, wondering what was going on. Meanwhile, Tommy Allen (St. Paul Academy) and James Leon (Bishop Amat, CA) of Team James Leon – Tim and I questioned this team name choice – were the first ones to reach the chapel and quickly swapped places with their teammates Joe Gathje (Bloomington Jefferson) and Gavin Swift (Bishop Garrigan, IA). Vincent Kaluza and Jacob Malecha (New Prague) came into the relay exchange at the chapel in 2nd place and passed off their canoe to AJ Karn (Wayzata) and Joe Coffey. Karn and Coffey had Joe Gathje and Swift in their sights the whole way back to the beach, eventually passing them to take over 1st place and establish our course record with a finishing time of 13:10.22. Highlights, including a video of the start line chaos:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1gv09DQtJSMs2nMSkmENYcy0MuUDZN93S/view?usp=sharing
ALUMNI MEET – TONI ST. PIERRE INVITATIONAL THIS FRIDAY
Another reminder that our Toni St. Pierre Alumni Invitational is this Friday at Boulder Ridge Golf Course in St. Cloud. Race week is here, and the guys are excited to see where they are at after a long summer of training. The women race at 6:00pm and men at 6:45pm. Alumni are welcome to race or spectate, and we are planning for a post-race gathering in the Boulder Ridge Golf Course clubhouse/restaurant with pizza, drinks, etc. Thanks to those of you who have already reached out about racing! Here is the link to register for the race for anyone else interested in running: https://www.directathletics.com/meets/xc/22411.html.
GO JOHNNIES CHALLENGE – THIS THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 7TH
Lastly, the Go Johnnies Challenge is this Thursday, September 7th as well. This is the Saint John’s athletic department’s annual fundraiser where every dollar you give and designate for cross country/track & field goes directly to us. This event is extremely important for our program, and in the past it has allowed us to provide opportunities and experiences that otherwise would not be possible. Examples include our 2021 trip to Oregon, our upcoming trip this season to race at the Pre-National meet in Pennsylvania, as well as the trip the track & field team takes to California almost every year. These trips, in cross country at least, put us in a better position to qualify for the national meet as a team by racing against teams from other regions, and they are also great team bonding trips for the guys that give them a chance to race against some higher competition. As Jeremy mentioned last week, your support also allows us to carry a larger roster and make sure everyone is provided with the same experience while on our team. Recently we have also purchased a Lightspeed Lift treadmill system, which is an anti-gravity training system that will aid in injury rehabilitation and prevention. It will help our guys get back to running quicker when coming back from an injury, and also serve the team in a preventative fashion for guys who have proven to be more injury prone in the past by allowing them to run with only about 60% of their body weight while on the treadmill – putting less impact and stress on their legs while running. Anyways, this is another great addition to our program that would likely not be possible without your support.
How to help:
Support the Cross Country/Track & Field Teams through a simple donation. Make sure to set Cross Country/Track & Field as the designation.
Become an advocate and encourage and promote the event on any social media outlets. We can use all the social media help we can get!
If so inclined, set up a matching gift that will encourage others to donate. Make sure to set Cross Country/Track & Field as the matching designation.
Enter dollar amount and decide if you will make the full gift regardless If the match is not complete met (check box)
Select “Other” and enter a dollar amount to give and check the “Per donor” box
Select the Match a designation box and select the designation you want to match
Fill out the rest of the form
Thank you so much for your support in years past, and Tim and I hope to see you on Friday in St. Cloud!
- Maxwell & Tim
Maxwell here -- It’s been a whirlwind last few weeks for obvious reasons, but a great first two weeks of practice. The guys are excited to be back on campus, and have had a great summer of training. Before going too much further, I just want to address the elephant in the room and say how excited and thankful I am to be in this position. I have a tremendous amount of respect for the tradition and history of this program, and am sincerely honored to be able to work towards it’s continued success. I said this in my quote in the original press release too, but I mean it... In my eyes, and I know in all of yours, there could not be a bigger act to follow. Luckily for me and the current team members, Tim will be sticking around to continue to provide his wisdom (and humor) to the team on a daily basis – all while being able to enjoy his morning at Subway in peace without being rushed to campus for any department staff meetings! In all seriousness, as you all know, Saint John’s has been beyond lucky to have Tim all these years, and we are still considering ourselves the “luckiest of the lucky” that he will continue to be involved with the team. Quite the volunteer assistant coach.
Tim talks about this more in his statement below, but we have our first meet next Friday in St. Cloud, the CSB+SJU Toni St. Pierre Invitational 5k at Boulder Ridge Golf Course, and would love to see as many alumni there as possible. A bit of a late notice, we know, but we are hoping to have a great team of alumni, of all ages, run in the race with our current team. Spectating alumni are more than welcome as well. TBA on some sort of alumni gathering after the races — either at the golf course’s restaurant or maybe somewhere in St. Joe. More info on that soon.
Here is our 2023 racing schedule, for those who are curious:
September 8th - Toni St. Pierre Invitational 5k (St. Cloud, Minn.)
September 16th - Running of the Cows 8k (Northfield, Minn.)
September 29th - UW Eau Claire Blugold Invite (Colfax, Wis.)
October 7th - Pre-National Meet (Carlisle, Penn.)
October 14th - UW La Crosse Jim Drews Invite (West Salem, Wis.)
October 28th - MIAC Championships (Northfield, Minn.)
November 3rd - Fall Finale (Collegeville, Minn.)
November 11th - NCAA North Regional (Colfax, Wis.)
November 18th - NCAA DIII Championships (Carlisle, Penn.)
Watch your inbox next week for a St. Michael’s Games competition update as well as more info about the upcoming season. With four of our top five from last year’s regional team returning this year and a great group of young up-and-comers, as well as a good-sized freshmen class, we are really looking forward to October and November.
And now for Tim’s portion of the message:
At age 69, I don’t think I need to explain my retirement. I am enjoying my free time while still getting to be a volunteer assistant coach. But with Maxwell eminently ready to go, this was absolutely the right time.
Maxwell has already breathed new life into our Saint Michael’s Games (intrasquad competition) with two new events: the watermelon eating contest and the canoe race. And our first race will be new, too, with the CSB/SJU Toni St. Pierre 5K Invitational at Boulder Ridge Golf Course on Friday, September 8th in the evening. 6 PM for the women, 6:45 PM for the men. This will be a joint Alumnae/Alumni Meet, and if ever there was a person and runner who could be celebrated by both teams, it would be Toni.
Toni attended Hopkins Eisenhower High School where she ran 2:18 and 5:02 before graduating in 1973. She was also an exceptional Nordic skier. Eisenhower had no girls teams at that time. The boys coach, Pat Lanin, told her she could run with the boys team, but the Minnesota State High School League said she could not. In a landmark case, Toni successfully sued the High School League for the right to do so.
When Toni enrolled at Saint Ben’s in 1973, there was not yet a cross country or track and field team, so she trained and, on at least one occasion, raced with the Saint John’s team. She was our teammate and, in every way, she was wonderful. Toni was competing at a very high level in triathlons well into her 50s before we lost her to cancer in 2013.
Let this first Toni St. Pierre Invitational be a celebration of Toni, and let it be a celebration of all the friendships we made during our college cross country years.
We hope to see you next Friday at the Toni St. Pierre Invitational and alumni meet, and hope you all had a great summer!
- Maxwell & Tim
Hello everyone,
Thanks to those of you who came out to watch our MIAC and North Regional races! It was great to see so many familiar faces.
MIAC Championships
The MIAC meet was held back in St. Paul, at a neutral site, for the first time since 2016 – and it was great. The course was wonderful, we had more fans and alumni come out to spectate than in recent years when the meet was not in the Twin Cities, and our guys ran great too. We finished 2nd, our highest finish since also placing 2nd in 2016, and had four All-MIAC performers, which was the most since 2007.
NCAA North Regional
We came into the regional meet hoping to take another step forward from our MIAC performance, and ended up finishing 7th in what we think is the toughest region in the country. Our guys again ran well and, other than some small adjustments for the future, we thought each guy ran about as good of a race as they could’ve. At the end of the day we wanted better than 7th, but that’s what keeps the fire lit for the future. Junior Lloyd Young qualified for the NCAA Championships individually for the second year in a row with his 10th place finish.
NCAA Division III Championships – Tomorrow!
Lloyd, as well as CSB’s top runner Fiona Smith, are both racing this weekend at the NCAA Championships in Lansing, Michigan with the women racing first at 11 a.m. Eastern Time and the men following at 12 p.m. Noon Eastern Time. Lloyd and Fiona finished 52nd and 5th last year, respectively, and both will be looking to improve on those performances come race day. Here is the link to the live stream to watch the races: https://www.ncaa.com/event/4230
DIII Men's Cross Country Championship - NCAA.com
DIII Men's Cross Country Championship on
www.ncaa.com
Tune in!
Until next time,
Tim & Maxwell
The MIAC Championship Cross Country Championship will return to St. Paul this Saturday, October 29 at the Highland 9 Hole Golf Course. The race begins on Edgecumbe Avenue about 100 meters south of Montreal. The finish line will be on along Montreal Avenue about 100 meters west of Edgecumbe. The women’s 6K race will start at 11:00 AM and the men’s 8K race will start at noon.
St. Olaf, Saint John’s, and Carleton are ranked 3rd, 7th, and 8th in the North Region. On the women’s side, St. Olaf, Carleton, Saint Ben’s, and Bethel are ranked 2nd, 3rd, 5th, and 8th.
Junior Lloyd Young (3rd at the MIAC Championship and 52nd at the NCAA Championship a year ago) will lead the Saint John’s effort. He has a strong supporting cast including seniors Dillon Diekmann, Mitchell Grand, Alexei Hensel and Tom Nemanich; juniors Carter Grove and Tommy Allen; and sophomore Eamon Cavanaugh. As ever, everybody on every team will compete in the varsity race.
It will be a great event on a wonderful spectator course. We hope to see you there.
PS: No dogs on the course!
Thank you to all for your generosity on our September 2 Go Johnnies fundraiser and of course at other times throughout the year. It is clear you know how much this enhances what we are able to do both fall and spring.
If you would like to purchase quality Saint John’s Cross Country t-shirts and sweatshirts and hats and such, you can do so by going to the link immediately below. Note that the ordering deadline is this Saturday, September 25 at midnightSeptember. You can have your item(s) delivered to your home address. This is not a Saint John’s fundraiser.
Bigteamstore.com
Passcode SJUCC21
Oredr items
Deadline 12:01 AM Sunday, September 26
After all the busy work of getting the school year and the season started, we are now (finally) much more about cross country than administration. No more forms to fill out! Coaches and especially athletes rejoice.
Our September 4 opener with Trinity College (North Dakota) at St. Cloud’s Boulder Ridge Golf Course satisfied the NCAA requirement that we race within two weeks of the start of practice. It also allowed us to knock some of the rust off and give us a fuzzy notion of where we were. Sophomore Lloyd Young led the way in 20:49 over the 6400 meter course. A very nice day in what has been a beautiful September in total.
We enjoyed a much bigger field and excellent competition at St. Olaf on Saturday, including five of the top nine ranked teams in our new North Region (Minnesota, Wisconsin, Finlandia of Michigan). We came fifth as a team with senior Andy Goldsmith leading the way in 11th place at 25:57. Andy and most all his teammates took a big step forward. Lloyd Young was fulfilling National Guard responsibilities but will be with us when we compete at the Hamline Invitational on Friday, October 1. That race will be a 4:30 PM start at the Highland Park 9 hole golf course in St. Paul. Come watch us if you are able.
Results for all our races can be found at gojohnnies.com
Tim
So much of what we do is made possible by the generosity of our alumni and friends. Tomorrow is the Go Johnnie Challenge. If you able to support the team again or for the first time, you can do so by going to this website.
2021 Go Johnnies Challenge · GiveCampus
Thanks for your financial support and for all the support which does not have a dollar figure on it. Our alumni are the best, as you all know.
2021 SAINT JOHN’S CROSS COUNTRY
This fall’s team numbers thirty-two. We were back on campus on August 23, one week before school begins. Because NCAA rules require that we race within two weeks of the start of practice, we will be host to a very small intercollegiate meet this Saturday, September 4 at Boulder Ridge Golf Course in St. Cloud. Saint Ben’s will compete at 9:30, and we will follow at 10:00 over 6400 meters.
A number of our guys took a big step forward last spring on the track. The following placed at 800 meters on up, and all return this fall. The year in school was their academic standing last spring.
Alexei Hensel So 800 M, 6th PR 1:54.82
Nate Clausing So 800 M, 7th PR 1:55.03
Mitchell Grand So 1500 M, 7th PR 3:55.90
Tommy Allen Fr 1500 M, 6th PR 3:58.80
Tom Nemanich So Steeplechase, 4th PR 9:43.02
Lloyd Young So 5000 M, 5th PR 14:49.63
10000 M, 6th PR 31:29.05
Andy Goldsmith Jr 10000 M, 7th PR 31:43.08
Steeplechasers Nate Meyer (now a senior) and Carter Grove (a sophomore) had good summers and are among others who will vie for a top seven spot in November.
A big change in Division III cross country is regional realignment. There are now ten regions. Minnesota and Wisconsin schools (and Finlandia College of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula) make up the North Region. There are still 32 teams advancing to the national meet, but only the winning team at each of the ten region meets will be an automatic qualifier. The remaining 22 will be decided by committee. There is no cap to the number of teams that may advance from any one region. The North Region Championship this fall will be at Whitetail Golf Course in Colfax, Wisconsin. This is Wisconsin-Eau Claire’s inviational course, which is about as good as it gets.
Other news: Maxwell Kuzara, SJU 2017, is our cross country assistant coach. Maxwell brings a experience, wisdom, and passion. Maxwell was with us last spring, and the team is happy to see him return.
Our 5K intra squad at Boulder Ridge Golf Course in St. Cloud (also a virtual dual with Concordia-Moorhead) went very well. Weather was as predicted less the precipitation, and the course, although a little soft in stretches, was in good shape and ran pretty fast. We still had nine on the sidelines, but we are getting there. Concordia’s times from their own 5K run in Moorhead beat us by a 28-29 margin. They finished 1-2-4, but we did have eight runners in front of their fifth man.
Kudos to our first finisher, junior Andy Goldsmith from Cascia Hall in Tulsa, Oklahoma, by way of La Crosse Aquinas. Andy began emerging last November when he was suddenly running in our top five with times in the mid 26’s. I told him he reminds me of another great runner from Aquinas who, like him, was always the first to arrive at practice. I cannot remember that fellow’s name, but his initials are Charlie Mahler.
Next up are time trials on the track on Saturday, October 17. While we had fancied our distance runners getting after a 5K, I would not be surprised if they opt to take a crack at the mile. They have added a gear or two over the past several weeks and I believe they would be confident in running it aggressively. And it would set them up for the 8K races to follow. We shall see.
Thanks to all who supported the cross country and track and field teams with the Johnnie Challenge earlier this month. A year from now, when, hopefully, we are able to travel again, we will renew using your generosity. For now, we are staying close to home and measuring ourselves with intra-squad competitions.
We began with a September 2 three mile time trial on the Wobegon Trail, running west to east. We started this run in eight waves departing at one minute intervals. Each wave was made up of a “pod” of three to five people who were mostly roommates. On a warm day, our top finisher was freshman Lloyd Young in 15:34. It was a start.
On Saturday, September 18 we met at the track for 800 and 1600 meter time trials. Runners started at 10 second intervals, essentially solo runs. Results were not spectacular, but we knocked a lot of rust off. Top performers were sophomores Alexei Hensel and Mitchell Grand in 2:02.8 and 4:30.9, respectively,
This past Saturday, September 25, we convened on the track again for 1600 and 3200 meter time trials. With little wind and temp in the mid 50s, conditions were favorable. More, I could sense our guys were starting to feel they were gaining racing fitness and looking forward to racing. We raced in groups of three to five.
1600 Meters
Tommy Allen, Fr 4:44.24
Seth Jackson, Sr 4:44.46
Danny Kloeppner, So 4:51.46
Carter Grove, Fr 4:55.94
Riley Berg, So 4:55.94
Nico Merickel, So 4:58.37
Charlie Otto, Jr 5:00.10
Max Vogel, Fr 5:01.57
Josh Anderson, Fr 5:05.57
Jacob Czech, Sr 5:07.73
Robbie Smith, Fr 5:14.75
3200 Meters
Mitchell Grand, So 9:29.34
Lloyd Young, Fr 9:30.41
Andy Goldsmith, Jr 9:36.71
Tom Nemanich, So 9:42.92
James Schwinghamer, Fr 9:45.50
Ryan Houseman, Sr 9:48.70
Alexei Hensel, So 9:49.71
Nathan Clausing, So 9:59.92
Nate Meyer, Jr 10:02.90
Sam Rengo, So 10:07.00
Justin Brakob, Sr 10:19.58
Bobby Harrison, Jr 12:10.98
Mostly minor ailments kept twelve others on the sideline, and more will race this Saturday in a 5K cross country race at Boulder Ridge Golf Course in St. Cloud. The Saint Ben’s team will race at 10:40; our Saint John’s team will follow at 11:10. This will be a virtual competition with Concordia-Moorhead’s team running a 5K cross country race on a home course of their own. We will compare times. Happily, the Boulder Ridge course is flat and, weather allowing, should run pretty fast. Expected weather at this writing is 42 degrees, 25 percent chance of precipitation, 3 mph.
After a lonely spring, it is great having the team together again. More to come.
SEPTEMBER 3 GO JOHNNIES CHALLENGE
The Go Johnnies Challenge is tomorrow, Wednesday, September 3. Jeremy did a great job of laying out the opportunities to contribute to the track and field and cross country teams in the blog he sent earlier today. I will include those opportunities, too, and the end of this report. He wrote a great blog, and I guarantee you will want to read it. Here’s a video describing The 2020 Jermey vs. Joe Decathlon Challenge they came up with.
OUR CROSS COUNTRY FALL
Thirty-eight souls have reported for the start of our cross country season. With the conference meet scheduled on April 10 at St. Olaf, it will be a long season. And that’s more than okay. It’s great to be back together again, and we hope we can keep it that way. Save when running or in their dorm rooms or apartments, everybody is masked up.
I am attaching our training and intra-squad racing plan for the fall. It will be a little different. We all missed the outdoor season, so we are going to have a bit of a hybrid approach which gives the mid-distance runners a chance to find a bit of their sweet spot this fall. We kicked things off this afternoon with a three mile time trial on the Wobegon Trail. We sized up the wind and put it at our backs.
Unless we have five or more intercollegiate cross country competitions next March and April (and we won’t), this cross country season will not count against anybody’s eligibility. So any person who happens to be back for a fifth fall will be good to go.
Saint Ben’s coach Robin Balder-Lanoue texted me this morning about a virtual 5K with Concordia on October 3 if we are interested. To keep things fair, I presume that would be on our respective tracks. This might work. You can see we had planned on a 5K or 8K intra-squad on Wildcat (by the Maple Sugar Shack) that day. And our Saint John’s track is more sheltered from big winds than is the Concordia track, so this might be more than fair.
I like our team a lot and in every way. Top returners from a year ago include:
Noah Webb (Sr., St. Cloud Tech): Noah has been in our top seven the past two falls and ran 25:58.3 on the Wartburg course at Regions as a sophomore.
Dillon Diekmann (Jr., Cretin-Derham Hall): Dillon was our third finisher at Regions a year ago.
Andy Goldsmith (Jr., Cascia Hall, Tulsa, Okla.): Andy emerged as our fourth finisher in 26:32.5 at last fall’s MIAC Championship.
Mitchell Grand (So., Hutchinson): Mitchell ran in our top seven as a freshman and finished 5th in last spring’s MIAC indoor mile in 4:19.66.
Tom Nemanich (So., Red Wing): Tom was All-Conference Honorable Mention with his 25th place finish in 26:14.2 last fall as a freshman.
Lloyd Young (Fr., Bloomington Kennedy): After a summer and fall of National Guard service, Lloyd enrolled last spring and ran indoor bests of 4:24.87 and 8:55.19 in the mile and 3K, respectively.
Support for this lead cast will come from a lot of others, including a bevy of strong middle-distance runners who had good summers and have an affinity for the 8K distance, too. You can find the complete college racing record of any collegiate athlete at tfrrs.com
A BUSY SPRING
Looking on the bright side, we are a young team, so a cross country championship on April 10 may be a good thing. This fall will be a big stepping stone. Next winter and spring will be, hopefully, busy. A MIAC indoor championship the last weekend in February. Weather allowing, a cross country race in mid-March. (Those who raced in the 1991 MIAC “Halloween Blizzard 28 inches of snow let’s move the meet to St. Olaf on Wednesday and plow a one mile loop and run it five times in a ten below zero windchill” Championship will be asking themselves, “Weather allowing?”) And then an outdoor season. Wonderful!
This all requires good science and good health. Godspeed to us all. Here we go!
Tim
MAKING A GIFT
There are a number of ways you can help:
1. Support the TF/CC programs through a simple donation. Make sure to set TF/CC as the designation. DONATE
2. Become an advocate and encourage and promote the event on any social media outlets. ADVOCATE
3. If so inclined, set up a matching gift that will encourage others to donate. Make sure to set TF/CC as the matching designation. MATCHING GIFT
a. Enter dollar amount and decide if you will make the full gift regardless If the match is not complete met (check box)
b. Select “Other” and enter a dollar amount to give and check the “Per donor” box
c. Select the Match a designation box and select the designation you want to match
d. Fill out the rest of the form
As you may know, our 2020 cross country season has been moved to the spring. Conference coaches have been charged with determining how best to get this done. I have already told Jeremy he would have to find his own distance runners next spring. Seriously, if you have any ideas, send them my way, and quickly. We coaches have a zoom meeting on Tuesday, August 4. The best I can come up with is an 8K road race the Saturday after indoor nationals. Maybe at the State Fairgrounds. After that, let’s just do track and field.
Cross country will be able to practice with coaches all fall and race as many as four times in the spring without losing eligibility. So at least we get to be together. For the first time, the team returns to campus one week before classes start. I had planned on doing this anyway, as it has become increasingly difficult to begin our season around Orientation. This will give us chance to have a few two-a-days and a little orientation time of our own before things get busy. It will also help the University phase in the return of students. We are hopeful we can have a healthy fall across both campuses. With that in mind, I have asked our guys to bring lawn chairs with them when they return.
More than any other sport, distance runners can keep on training through odd times. This has been an opportunity to train well and run a lot of miles. But twelve months without a race is too long. We are going to do some fun things this fall from 1500 meters through 8000 meters. Picture a 5K under the lights with racers starting in lanes 1, 3, 5, and 8. Lanes all the way. Lane 8 will run 11 laps and 85 meters.
St. Michael’s Games afficionados will appreciate that the egg toss will be a solo event. You toss it, you catch it.
Finally (for now), please see the attachment below if you would like to order Saint John’s Cross Country tee-shirts, sweatshirts, hats, etc. This is NOT a fundraiser. All deliveries will be to your home address. Note that your deadline for ordering is Wednesday, August 5.
Best to you and yours,
Tim
320-291-4795
The gun goes off, and I think to myself, “How great is this.”
Wartburg hosted the NCAA Central Regional on their campus course. This is a very good course which hosted nationals in 2010. This year, after a wet fall and with late morning temperatures creeping into the mid to high 30s, the course ran sloppier and seemingly 40 seconds slower than last year’s frozen track.
Our guys raced well – our best outing of the fall – and finished 9th with 272 points in a 31-team field.
Champion Carleton and runner-up Wartburg are automatic qualifiers to nationals. St. Olaf and St. Thomas came 3rd and 4th and will also be racing in Louisville. Carleton’s Matt Wilkinson ran an even-paced race and won going away in an exceptional 24:56.8. Full results can be found at: https://results.wayzatatiming.com/meets/4768 or gojohnnies.com/
HIGH POINT FEVER
Beginning midway through the season, at every competition, my old teammate Kevin Carlson (’75) would call me within minutes of our last man crossing the line. “How did Mitchell finish? What was his place?” Indeed, Freshman Mitchell Grand of Hutchinson was turning heads in his pursuit of the 2019 High Point Man title. Grand was among our scoring five in five of his six races, and he tallied an impressive 329 points to lead the team. Carlson has remained Saint John’s All-Time Career High Point Man since tallying an even 1000 points during his storied career from 1971 to 1974.He is fain to see his career mark surpassed but offers young Mitchell some advice, “The key is the national meet. A guy can score a lot of points at a national meet.”
*Kevin was three times All-Conference in cross country and won conference titles on the track at three miles as a sophomore and at six miles as a senior.
IN THE VAN
in the early years, guys brought their favorite tapes, and we all listened to the same music. Then headsets came along and it was every man for himself. Our 2019 team plays chess versus each other on their smart phones. Our team GPA, the finest in the college.
OUR WINTER PLAN
2 weeks light running / active recovery
December 5 weeks to Increase mileage
January 6 return to campus approaching peak training volume
CONFERENCE MEET PHOTOS courtesy of BJ PICKARD and EMILY CARR of the MIAC OFFICE
Last Friday’s Fall Finale was like a lot of our Fall Finales: low 30s and gray skies going quickly to nightfall, our last finisher nearly in the dark. We tip our hats to those like-minded programs which look for a late-season racing opportunity for those not in their top seven: Gustavus, Hamline, Bethel, Martin Luther College, and the University of Minnesota (running unattached this time around). Thanks for coming again this year.
For the real old-timers (pre 1996) who never took part as a competitor or as an official (our top seven every year), it goes like this. The Fall Finale is six days after the conference meet. If we still have daylight saving time, we start at 5:00 PM. If not, as this year, we start at 4:30 and hope nobody gets stuck in the woods after dark.
The race starts on Water Tower Road, between the Prep School and the water towers. The women’s 5K starting line is 30 meters behind the men’s 8K starting line. At the gun, both men and women head for the driveway that drops below the Prep School dormitory, cross the Prep soccer field, and then take a right at the Chapel Trail. After about 500 meters on the Chapel Trail, take the trail which brings you right to the back of the Prep School. Take a left onto the sidewalk which wraps around the Prep School and goes back to Water Tower Road. Now up the “Upper Entrance Road” toward the foot bridge, but take a right to enter the trail where the old SJU Invite course re-entered the woods. Onto that trail and come out on the road behind the Prep School softball field dugouts. Take a right and head back to the entrance road. Take a left and back toward the start. Repeat. The second lap, however, includes a 545 meter loop on the grassy field below the Prep School before getting on the Chapel Trail.
Women run a shorter variation: only one Prep School loop but two consecutive loops on the north end. Men and women use the same finish chute, then we hand out results and top ten tee-shirts at the indoor track.
There is a lot of positive energy. Although the course is 60 percent asphalt, it twice climbs from the lake to the water tower. An honest 8000 meters which runs, I think, about 15 seconds faster than the Como 8K. A chance for a fast time. A lot of fans in a somewhat confined area with the women finishing in one direction while the men run the opposite way. Intimate and hectic. Steve Plasencia first brought his Gophers to the race in 2006. The next day, at the State Meet, he told me “I really liked the collegiality”. Yes.
You can Find Fall Finale and all other results at gojohnnies.com, but a quick shout out to senior Sam Cruz, our first finisher in 26:57. I believe Andy Clasen has Saint John’s best ever Fall Finale time at 26:15 in 2010. If I am incorrect, I’m certain Andy will let us know. Alumni are always welcome. Todd Hierlmaier (2001) and Sam Friesen (2017) joined the fray last week.
Next up: Saturday’s NCAA III Central Regional at Wartburg College, Waverly, Iowa. 11 AM. Wish us well as we do you.
The Fall Finale
By Stewart Pidrimes
The geese fly south, the geese fly low
November’s come, their time to go
Leaves turn red, yellow, brown
Fallen, deep, upon the ground
With blue sky we are rare blessed
Winter soon will be our guest
But not yet done, we toe the line
To run the hillsides one last time
Running tall and looking good
We take our footrace to the wood
One last chance to meet the test
To lace them up and do our best
Snow will soon be here, we reckon
Days get short and winter beckons
But we’re not done, not yet by golly
Till we have run the Fall Finale
This is a busy week in Collegeville with our Fall Finale on Friday and our top eight readying for the Central Regional next Saturday, November 17, at Wartburg College in Waverly, Iowa. Friday looks to be racing friendly: 33 degrees and 10 mph on a course that is pretty-well protected. Visiting teams will be Gustavus, Hamline, Bethel, Martin Luther, five Golden Gophers running unattached, and of course Saint Ben’s running on the women’s side. Race time is 4:30 PM.
Last Saturday at the MIAC Championship on Carleton’s outstanding course, pretty much our whole team stepped forward with much better races, and we finished sixth with 143 points. Senior Trey Collins (17th, 26:02) and freshman Tom Nemanich in (25th, 26:14) earned Honorable Mention All-Conference. Junior Noah Webb (26th, 26:15), sophomore Andy Goldsmith (34th, 26:32), and freshman Mitchell Grand (41st, 26:56) completed our scoring five. Sophomore Justus Fast (49th, 27:05) and junior Ryan Houseman (51st, 27:06) came 6th and 7th.
This was a big step forward for the team. A “finally” meet, and it was fun to see. We were better positioned in the early going and moved up throughout. We come out of this meet with a different view of the Regional, especially with sophomore Dillon Diekmann (a little bit snake bit with injuries) rejoining his teammates in Waverly. I like this team.
We are not finished yet and, to that end, I am including below a column I wrote for The Record in March of 1996. Each coach in turn was asked to report on their team’s season, and it was my turn.
IT’S NEVER TOO LATE
This is undoubtedly the worst time to ask me to write a column. March is the longest month of our season. We have been training either on icy roads or indoors for eight weeks. We competed in the conference indoor meet the first weekend of the month and now are in a watching and waiting mode to see how soon the snow will disappear. (The ice was entirely off the Sag on March 26 in 1981, a very good year.) The Palaestra arena is never more stark and barren than during these days in March. Late in the month I know I will be questioning my life decision to become a track and field coach, never mind that eleven months of the year I am confident I have the best possible "job". And so I was reassured this morning when Dan Besemann, our decathlete who loves our sport as much as anybody I know, told me he's got the blahs, too. He had just finished throwing the discus ... into a net. And it is reassuring to know, from experience, that all will be better than well on that first day I am standing under glorious sunshine and watching our track and field athletes do track and field things.
In the meanwhile, we have a lot of work to do, and we keep on keeping on. Cross country and track and field are much more about training than playing. Fans and fanfare are few, but I am more than appeased by knowing our sport has great appeal to folks who value intrinsic rather than extrinsic rewards. These are good people to join in an endeavor.
In 1972 Frank Shorter won the Olympic Marathon in Munich. In 1976 he finished second in Montreal. I was student teaching at Cretin High School in St. Paul, and my supervising teacher's summation of Shorter's finish was simple: "Poor Shorter. Four years of training wasted." Never mind that this fellow was an exceptional chemistry teacher; he failed to appreciate that, for Shorter, the real reward of averaging 120 miles per week over an eight year period was in the journey. When we undertake any serious athletic endeavor, we have to understand that, on that final day, there are no guaranteed walks to the top step (or any step) of the victory stand. The journey alone may have to be enough, and so it had better be.
That being so, I will still tell one story with a happy ending.
Mike McGowan and I began together at Saint John's in the fall of 1979, he as a freshman distance runner and me as cross country and track and field coach. Mike had been a state champion in the mile at Blue Earth, and he enjoyed an exceptional freshman season at Saint John's, finishing fifth at 1500 meters at the MIAC championship. His time, 3:55.7, was the equivalent of a 4:15 mile.
Over the next three years, Mike showed marked improvement in cross country, but after finishing a disappointing fifth in his final MIAC championship, his 1500 meters best remained at 3:55.7. He had yet to ever qualify for an NCAA track and field championship. One week later, Mike toed the line at the Carleton Last Chance Meet. He ran a smart and relaxed race and crossed the finish line in 3:52.1, setting a school record, qualifying for nationals, and sending his teammates into a whooping frenzy. My scalp tingled. Mike graduated the next day (he called it a "good" weekend), and the following Thursday he improved again to
3:51.9 in the qualifying round at the NCAA championship. In Saturday's final he finished ninth in 3:49.9, faster than five of the winning times in years since.
Happy endings are never guaranteed. We know only one thing for certain: if Mike McGowan had not brought his humility and pride to that Carleton starting line, his personal best would still be 3:55.7. His real glory was in having tried. Another moral: it is never too late.
Telling old stories is pleasant. Seeing new ones unfold, especially in outdoor championship competition, is exciting. And so we keep on training in anticipation of new stories and new heroes. It's enough to keep a guy going, even in March.
Tim Miles
March, 1996
Pat Haws, our swimming and diving coach for about thirty years, told me he stumbled onto something that really helped him and his divers in practice and competition. He would time his diver from first motion until the moment of departure. Which had nothing (and everything) to do with what happened in the air. Too fast or too slow got a less than optimal result.
Joe Vardas, our jumps coach, will tell you that if the first phase of the triple jump is too elevated, the jumper will spend the next two phases “in crisis management”.
After watching a bevy of terrific discus throwers in the MIAC in 1980, my first year coaching at Saint John’s, I went to the Olympic Trials in Eugene and could not believe how “slow” the 200 and 225 foot guys were in the back of the circle. Al Oerter, Mac Wilkins, John Powell, et al for you old-timers.
My brother, Bill, tells how, when one of his Wayzata runners opened an early season 1600 meter race in 59 seconds, he (Bill) hollered with great gusto “3:56, Jimmy, 3:56!!” He made his point, and the race result much more so.
A good beginning is paramount, and our team executed much better at the UW La Crosse Jim Drews Invitational this past Saturday. We will attempt to do better still at the MIAC Championship, our next outing. Of course racing fitness is never static. We never know what our optimum pace and early positioning may be on the next race day, but we want to put ourselves in or near a spot where we can get our best result. That is to say, we love it when “5:10 becomes the new 5:20”. Which is really what we are all about. Redefining ourselves.
The wet weather afforded us the opportunity to do 10 x 400 (fast and relaxed) on the outdoor track yesterday (the football team went under the bubble). With the reshaping of the intramural fields, we now have a nice 700 meter loop which has served us well, but it was just a little soggy. Saturday morning we will do a three mile tempo run on Collegeville.
And then the MIAC Championship at Carleton on Saturday, November 2. We race at 11:00, the women race at noon. The State Meet is on the other side of town at St. Olaf. Come and watch us.
Enjoy your fall. It is beautiful up here in Collegeville.
Hello. I apologize for not writing more often. I cite two reasons. First, I need to dumb down my blogging expectations of myself. That is, I need to remind myself I am not trying to write the perfect letter of recommendation for a graduate school applicant. Nor the perfect poem. I read Neil Young’s biography of a few years ago, Waging Heavy Peace, in which he unapologetically admits to having written a lot of lousy songs. Which makes it easier for me to accept having written a lot of lousy poems. And I will ride that horse as I write these blogs.
Second, there has not been much to report. We have under-performed our first three times out (Luther, Carleton, and Eau Claire) largely because I have over-coached, too often telling stories of past teams running an even pace and running their intemperate competitors down. But times have changed. For some time now, fields have been running much more intelligent races than in the past. So far this fall, we have been starting too slow and too far back and not getting engaged in the race. Never more so than our last effort at Eau Claire.
I like our team. As ever, terrific people. And we can run a little bit. Trey Collins (Senior, Royalton, Minn.), off a 1200 mile summer, leads the way. Trey has placed third in both the 5000 and 10,000 at MIAC Outdoors, and he was 7th at the Carleton Invitational. Dillon Diekmann (Sophomore, Cretin-Derham Hall, St. Paul, Minn.) performed well at Carleton, too, in 20th place with his best race ever. And Freshman Tom Nemanich (Red Wing, Minn.) is off to a good start, having run 26:11 at Eau Claire. Noah Webb (junior, Tech, St. Cloud, Minn.) also had a very good summer. Noah was 45th at the Central Regional last fall in 25:58. We have a lot of candidates to flush out our top seven creditably, once we begin racing well. Our next meet is the UW La Crosse Invitational which is now run at the Ettrick Country Club in Ettrick, Wisconsin. We race at 10:30 on Saturday, October 19.
COACHING POSITIONS
Every now and then, I am made aware of college cross country and/or track and field coaching openings near and far. Please let me know if you would like such information forwarded your way.
FINISH THE RUN
It was great to see so many Saint John’s and Saint Ben’s alums remembering David Forster (2011) at the 4th annual Finish the Run 5K on Boom Island on September 8. A great event which reminds us to “live with intention”. See you next year. And next time, hang around until I finish.
HALL OF HONOR
And it was great to see a good number of our storied alums at the Hall of Honor event in Guild Hall this past Saturday. Photo below. John Cragg was unable to accept his award in person, but his teammate, Chuck Ceronsky (1970) and my teammate, Andy Cragg (1978) stood in for him.
SAINT MICHAEL’S GAMES
After four events (Home Run Derby, Egg Toss, Wheelbarrow Relay, Somersault Relay), the score is as follows:
Uncle Moneybags 13
Saloon Girls 12
Mister Rogers 12
Big Red Rock Eaters 7
Very exciting.
