The men's cross country team had an impressive showing at its season opener, the Maine Invitational, hosted by Bowdoin.
Placing four athletes in the top 10, with their top five all finishing under the 26 minute barrier — an impressive feat — the Jumbos handily took home first among seven teams, with a total of 35 points. Bates took second with 56 and Bowdoin third with 60 points.
The Jumbos used the race as way to test their fitness and summer training, while previewing the NCAA New England Div. III Championship course.
Tufts was led by junior Matt Rand, who took first overall with a time of 25:05, a personal best 8,000-meter time of nearly 40 seconds. Rand broke away from the pack in the third mile and controlled the race from then on.
"[The plan was to] take the first mile pretty conservatively. This being the first race, you don't want to go out too fast," Rand said. "I felt good and the first two miles were very easy, so I picked it up in the third mile and put maybe 10 seconds ahead of the two Bates guys behind me, and then just tried to hang on for the last two miles."
Bates sophomore Tully Hannan crossed the finish second with a time of 25:11, with teammate Devin Dilts in third in 25:20.
Sophomore Ben Wallis was the fourth finisher overall and second for the Jumbos, coming in at 25:26.
"You never really know what to expect in your first race of the season, but it was a good start race," Wallis said. "It went out slower than I think everyone expected … After the first mile, I found myself farther up than I expected so I decided to group up with [junior] Kyle Marks and Matt Rand and see how long that could last…. [After Matt broke away] Kyle and myself just tried to hold on to where we were in the pack, and the guys behind myself did a really great job of moving up in the race."
The next finisher for Tufts was senior Connor Rose, whose impressive last mile moved him up several places to eighth. Rose crossed the line in 25:35 and Marks was just half a second behind in ninth.
Sophomore Andrew Shapero rounded out the scorers for Tufts with a 13th place finish in 25:52.
Senior co-captain Scott McArthur and sophomores Brian McLaughlin and Benji Hansen accompanied their teammates in the top 25 of a field of 144 runners, finishing in 18th, 24th and 25th, respectively.
Using this meet as a gauge of their fitness, the Jumbos liked the results they saw.
"We had almost everyone under 28:00 and the top five under 26:00, which is partly because of the course, but it still says a lot about the fitness of our team, and we really showed the potential of this team and that we have a good shot at regionals," Wallis said.
With PRs earned across the board, the squad demonstrated its strength this season to regional competitors Bates and Bowdoin, which both finished ahead of Tufts at the regional championship last fall.
"It proves that we've all come into the season in great shape," Rand said. "The summer mileage has paid off, and we're ready to start doing some hard workouts and fine-tune our speed, and then we'll be one of the teams to beat come championship season."
For the freshmen, the race was not only their first at the collegiate level, but also their first at the 8k distance.
Sam Garfield and Nicholas Guarnaccia led the way for the class of first-years, finishing 36th and 40th overall — ninth and 12th for Tufts, respectively.
"I was really impressed with the freshmen," Wallis said. "In past years, freshmen have been able to make an immediate impact, with how talented our upperclassmen are this year, it's hard to contribute scoring-wise right away, but they all ran some incredible times for an 8k, which is a hard distance to get accustomed to. I am still getting the hang of it as a sophomore, but they looked like seasoned veterans out there."
Though the Jumbos' finish was already exciting on its own for their race, the team looks even more promising knowing two of the squad's top five runners from the 2010 season sat out this weekend.
Sophomore Liam Cassidy and junior Tyler Andrews both are coming back to full strength from injuries and rested this weekend, instead of rushing back into racing.
"They're both on their way back, but they are being cautious," Rand said. "They don't want to make their injuries worse, but they will both be healthy and contributing soon."
The squad's top seven will run this course again on Nov. 12 for the New England Div. III Championships.
According to Wallis and Rand, it was the flattest and fastest course they had ever run.
"It is very helpful to race the course before regionals, because there are a lot of sharp turns and narrow spots, and you need to know when they are coming up, so you can handle them the right way," Rand said. "Having this race will give us a hand up on teams who didn't have a chance to run it before."
Next Saturday, the Jumbos will stay in Boston for the Codfish Bowl at Franklin Park.
