Augustana men’s cross country headed home following their ninth place finish in the Pre-Nationals meet in Terre Haute, Indiana, on Friday, Oct. 4. Following a resounding victory at the Brissman-Lundeen Invitational, the men’s team looked to capitalize on a dominant win and carry their momentum into a not-so-familiar environment filled with talented teams and individuals, giving them a worthy test.
On Saturday, Sept. 28, Augustana fans were treated to a win on friendly territory when they steam-rolled to a victory at the Brissman-Lundeen Invitational at Saukie Golf Course. Augustana was able to claim three finishers among the top five and two more in the top 25. Senior Finbar Martin was the top overall finish at the invitational and knows that a team-oriented attack is nowhere near foreign to these athletes.
“Coach Flores was just telling us to run together as a team and run with the pack we work out in,” Martin said. “So that was the angle, just to run together and just work through the race and compete, and I think we did that pretty well.”
Augustana’s second-year cross country coach, Kyle Flores, has said he has found his groove in getting the best out of his runners and pushing them to compete in every race. When asked about the jump from his first to his second year, Flores noted how much easier it has been the second time around.
“It’s been way better the second year, to be quite frank,” Flores said. “It’s really nice to know your athletes and your coworkers a lot better. I think it makes things a lot more enjoyable.”
While the first to second-year jump may have made things easier for Coach Flores, that certainly doesn’t mean it wasn’t a process getting everything ready and set in motion before the start of the season. The amount of preparation Flores did this summer does nothing less than help us understand why the team has been so successful to start the year and why the expectations they have put on themselves are far from lofty.
“Mostly it was thinking about team goals, really trying to focus on what the whole season would look like as an overview, what we’re trying to peak for, and where we’re kind of at as a team with that,” Flores said. “Just a lot of the thought processes and trying to figure out what this team needs during the season.”
For Flores, the most important part of his preparation is how much his team has bought into his ideas and goals. Senior Joe Langridge made it easy to see where this jump in team production has come from. Langridge missed a few weeks while dealing with an injury, but that didn’t slow him down in his race in the Brissman-Lundeen Invitational, where he placed fifth.
“Grant, Finbar, and I lived here [Rock Island] this summer, just down the hill, and we all got pretty high mileage this summer, which is kind of what you want going into a cross-country season,” Langridge said. “We were getting up to like 100-mile weeks, 80-mile weeks, and being consistent, and that’s shown early in the season with the good performances this early, which usually isn’t the case for us.”
Even while sidelined, Langridge has closely watched his Vikings teammates. When asked about his evaluation of the men’s team, Landridge didn’t mince words.
“Really, really, really good,” Langridge said. “This is the best we’ve looked as a team since I’ve been here.”
Unsurprisingly, the men’s cross-country team has opened the season with a solid start and that looks to continue following a top-ten finish at the D-III Pre-Nationals meet this past Friday. The Pre-Nationals meet included Martin finishing 22 individually while Langridge and Ackard finished 31 and 32, respectively.