Augustana’s women’s cross country season is starting to come to an end.  The team has one more meet in West Salem, Wisconsin at the UW-LaCrosse Invite, and after that they have the CCIW championship meet.
After conference the girls will start regional’s, and head coach Fredrick Whiteside is optimistic that the team can make it to nationals.
Last season, the girls cross country team won conference and they are hoping to repeat this year.  The girls were recently ranked 6th in the Midwest Regional Poll.  In the CCIW, there are only two other teams that are in the top ten with Augustana.  North Central is ranked third, and Wheaton College is ranked ten.
Whiteside thinks that Augustana’s biggest competition that could prevent them from repeating a conference championship is North Central.  The team has ran in five meets so far this year and has not finished in the bottom half of any competition.
Last Saturday, the girls ran at the Wartburg Invitational in Waverly, Iowa.  The team took second and it helped them to get into the top ten of the regional poll.  Senior Becca Sund took first place,  Senior Lizzie Lundine took 3rd place, and Jessica Bacon took 8th.  These three runners helped the team take fifth in a field of 35 teams.
This year the teams top five runners are all fourth year senior runners, giving the team a lot of experience.
“I think that the team is very strong this year,” said senior Jessica Bacon. “Even though we have been doing well in meets, it doesn’t show how strong the team really is.  I think the team runs very hard in practice and we need to bring that to CCIW championship meet, if we want to beat North Central  repeat our victory from last year.”
Bacon also thinks that the team needs to look ahead after the conference meet.  She felt that last year’s team was good enough to make it to nationals but did not look forward after conference.  The team got too consumed with winning conference and did not prepare well enough for the regional meet.
The team has only one more meet before conference at the UW-Lacrosse to help them gauge how good they are going to be.  Coach Whiteside thinks that this is a great meet to help them prepare for conference.  This meet has 40 teams running, and many of the teams are ranked in the nation.
“If we do well at this meet then I think that the team will be able to do well at conference this year, and should be able to win again,” said Whiteside.
Whiteside, like Bacon, thinks that the team has a good chance to make it to nationals this year, and there are individuals on the team that should also be able to make it to nationals.  The best aspect of the team in Whiteside’s opinion is their experience.
“Our five top runners have been through seasons for the last four years,” said Whiteside. “And they know that they have to keep going to the end of the season.  One of our biggest goals was to beat North Central not only at conference, but at the UW-LaCrosse meet as well.”
The CCIW championship is on the first of November, and regionals is two weeks later.  Everyone on the team is helping to motivate each other to prepare for both of these competitions.