By Adam Hensley
Iowa cross-country will head to Normal, Illinois, today for the Illinois State Invitational, its second meet of a not-so-normal season.
With a coach who’s been on staff for barely a month leading a team that opened its season in surprising fashion, the Hawkeyes aim to keep exceeding expectations when the women kick off the 5,000 meters at 5 p.m., followed by the men’s 8,000 at 5:45 p.m.
Senior Tess Wilberding and junior Michael Melchert captured the spotlight at the first meet of the season, the Hawkeye Invitational, on Sept. 2.
Wilberding snagged the top individual spot for the women in the meet with a winning time of 10:20.4, leading the way in the team’s first-place finish.
“It was kind of sentimental because it’s my last year,” Wilberding said. “I was sort of thinking about my first race freshman year, how it was [there].”
On the men’s side, Melchert finished sixth but broke the school record in the 6,000 meters, which hadn’t been touched since 2005. His 18:12.8 was six seconds faster than Eric MacTaggart’s previous top time.
His finish proved instrumental for the Hawkeyes, who finished second.
“The race got out a lot quicker than last year, so it was good for a fitness test,” Melchert said. “Getting out hard definitely is my specialty.”
Both Hawkeyes caught the attention of cross-county coach Randy Hasenbank, who is still trying to gauge how his runners stack up in competition.
Hasenbank sees the Illinois State Invitational as another opportunity for both teams to slowly build up to their full race distances.
“It’s important to start running those race distances that give us a better evaluation of our fitness,” he said.
At the 2015 Illinois State Invitational, the men finished second and the women placed fifth.
Seniors Anthony Gregorio and Ben Anderson both finished in the top 10 for Iowa in last year’s meet, and it proved to be the Hawkeyes’ most closely contested outing of the year. Illinois State won the meet with 79 points, just 1 in front of Iowa.
The women’s race did not go so well. Junior Madison Waymire was Iowa’s lone bright spot; she and Wilberding were Iowa’s only runners in the top 25.
Loyola, which Hasenbank coached at the time, won the meet and scored five runners in the top 16, finishing ahead of Iowa by 50 points.
But this season has proved to be different, and both teams are hungry to get back on the course and continue to make names for themselves.
Hasenbank said a competitive spirit is crucial in finishing on top, and that’s one of many things he will look for in Illinois.
“I want to see how we cover the 8,000 meters,” he said. “I think I’d like to see both squads learn to be patient without giving up a whole lot in the race — get through the halfway point feeling really comfortable and solid, then push a little bit in the back half of the race.”
Following the conclusion of the Illinois State Invitational, Iowa gets a week off. Both teams’ next opportunity comes on Sept. 24, when they travel to Minneapolis for the Roy Griak Invitational.