Men's XC Finishes 2nd, Women Place 14th at Penn State National Invite

Oct. 15, 2005

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STATE COLLEGE, Pa. - Competing against regional, conference and national-caliber teams, the American University cross country men's team finished second while the women's team placed 14. Steve Hallinan (Drexel Hill, Pa./Cardinal O'Hara) led the Eagle men to a runner-up team trophy with his seventh place finish and on the women's side Keira Carlstrom (Oakton, Va./Oakton) also finished in seventh to help the team to a 14th place finish.

From the start of the men's race, Providence College's Martin Fagan ran out to a big lead that only widened as the miles went by as he cruised to a 24:56 easy victory for the men's individual title. Behind him Hallinan was a part of the chase pack the flew through the first mile in 4:38. Behind him a pack of Eagles were separated by a handful of seconds as almost 300 competitors fought for position on the narrow trail.

Ten minutes into the race Hallinan charged to the lead of the chase pack, which strung it out and whittled it down to a group of eight racers. The Cardinal O'Hara legend continued to pound away for second place, but encountered a rough spot in the fourth mile and lost ground to three competitors. In the hilly last mile, Hallinan battled and closed strongly for a seventh place finish in 25:33.

Behind him the Eagles' scoring pack stuck closely together. By the fifth mile Brendan Fennell (Pearl River, N.Y./Pearl River) had worked his way up from around 80th place at the mile to second on the team and top-30 overall. On the long uphill before the race's last 400 meters, the sophomore started rolling, charging past numerous racers. A strong kick in the final straightaway propelled him past a handful of finishers for 23rd in 25:55. Awit Yohannes (Derwood, Md./Magruder), who had adopted a conservative race strategy early on watched it pay off as he also worked his way up from way back in the pack early on to finish a mere eight seconds behind Fennell in 30th. Conor Lanz (Valley Stream, N.Y./Valley Stream) and Pat Burford (Bellmore, N.Y./John F. Kennedy) who had been separated by no more than five strides the whole race finished together, just six ticks back from Yohannes with a 26:09 for 36th and 37th places, respectively.

Eagles senior captain Phil Turner (Reedsburg, Wis./Reedsburg Area) finished sixth for the Eagles only moments later as he finished 45th in 26:19. The pride of Reedsburg, Wis. had arguably the finest race of his career as he averaged a swift 5:03 per mile on the undulating 5.2 mile course. Freshman Kevin Tschirhart (Northport, N.Y./Northport) finished three seconds later in 26:22 to round out AU's top seven. Rob Hofmann (Wantagh, N.Y./W.C. Mepham) also competed for American as he averaged 5:09 per mile on his way to a 26:45, 91st place finish.

As a team, AU's scorers averaged 25:58 and had a minimal 37 second spread.

The women's race was dominated by No. 1 ranked Duke University who swept the top three spots. Even though she was coming back from some time off due to sickness, Carlstrom was among the leaders from the start. The senior captain bided her time in the front group as they cruised through a 2:32 half mile, 5:28 mile and 11:05 two mile split. The front group splintered on the uphills of the last mile as Carlstrom struggled to maintain in contact. In the race's final half-mile, she was running the same pace as the strung out group ahead of her but could not make up any ground and wound up seventh in 20:53.

Behind her fellow senior captain Zaia Wharton (Elkins, W. Va./Elkins) ran her best race of the season, passing handfuls of runners in the second half of the race to finish 43rd in 22:08, a time 17 seconds faster than her result in 2004. The underclassmen contingent of Mary Moloney (Bay Village, OH/St.Joseph's Academy), Cathleen Ford (Cornwall-on-Hudson, N.Y./Cornwall Central) and Kate Lilley (Portland, Ore./St. Mary's) rounded out the scoring for AU. Moloney averaged 6:13 miles on her way to a 106th place finish in a time of 23:13. Ford finished eight seconds after her in 118th and Lilley ran 23:55 for 162nd. Newcomers Hilary Roth (Elysburg, PA/Southern Columbia Area) and Megan Mason (State College, Pa./State College) had a tight battle for closing out the Eagles' top seven as Roth just edged Mason for 191st. Both harriers were timed at 24:28.

The AU team finished 14th out of 34 teams with an average time of 22:42 in the women's race, which was stacked with four ranked teams.

Two weeks remain until the Eagles go to Lehigh for the Patriot League Championships on Oct. 29.