Nov. 23, 2015I’m sure many of you watched live or have since seen results, but in case you haven’t heard: Ben Tuttle went to Joplin, Missouri on Saturday for NCAA II Nationals and ran the fastest cross country 10K in Cedarville history, 30:08, and placed 16th, the best in Cedarville history, earning himself an NCAA All-American medal. Like he always has, he ran the race exactly the way he wanted, sticking on the back of the lead pack and moving up as others fell off the ever-increasing pace. His breathing in the second half of the race kept him from dropping the incredible negative splits the top guys did, but he finished just as hard as he started and stayed competitive with the guys in his pack until the line.
I couldn’t imagine a better ending for Ben. The toughness he showed and the smile on his face at the end personified everything I’ve seen and learned from Ben in the three years I’ve known him. For a more exhaustive tribute to Ben, scroll down to my post from Regionals. Anything I say here would simply be reiterating what I said there.
I do, however, want to talk about our other senior, Forrest Thayer. Last week at Christian Nationals (NCCAA), Forrest ran a 50 second PR and broke the 26:00 barrier for the first time! I wasn’t there to watch it, but having watched Forrest race for the last three years, I guarantee he had a special look in his eye and ran with a determination that refused to be denied. Forrest is one of the most intense runners I’ve ever met. When he’s in the zone, watch out, because it’s about to get real. He’s taught me so much about perseverance and hard work. Forrest has logged more miles in the last two years than anyone on the team (including Ben because Ben rode his bike all summer instead of running) and works harder than anyone in workouts. His racing hasn’t been where he hoped it would, but he’s continued to enthusiastically give his all every day. He has set a high standard for our team in terms of work ethic and dedication.
Off the course, Forrest’s hard work and dedication manifest themselves in the classroom. He’s an honor student in mechanical engineering and has already accepted a full-time job with Cummins in Indiana after graduation. We’ve joked that Forrest’s big PR’s at Christian Nationals this year and two years ago came because he is more in touch with God than anyone else and gets home field advantage for that. Although a joke, there’s some truth behind it. His passion for running and engineering are exceeded by his passion for holiness. He’s set a standard on our team of living in a Christ-like manner and has been a huge leader in our Bible study for the last two years. He challenges me both directly and by the way he lives to eradicate sin in my life and run hard after God. He’s the nicest guy I’ve ever met and I can’t thank him enough for the example he’s set for me over the last three years.
Whew. Another season is in the books. Our team has come a long ways. Last year we were talented, but immature. This year we saw a lot of growth and the first fruits of the talent that’s there. We stayed healthy for the most part and the months of hard training going all the way back to June have paid off in the last month. Many of the guys are already getting back into training for track and much of the conversation has turned to next season. Our region will again have five qualifying spots for nationals and almost every team in this year’s Top 12 brings back almost everyone from this year. We’ll be in for another fight, but we’re up for the challenge.
I’m thinking back over this season and like every season of every sport I’ve played in my life, there’s such a mix of emotions. So many memories, some good and some bad, are racing through mind. There are so many stories I could tell, some stories full of excitement, triumph, and laughter, other stories of full of disappointment, pain, and tears. Every season is a roller coaster ride of ups and downs. But, like we’ve been studying in our Bible study, God uses the hard times as well as the good to form us into the people He wants us to be and to spread His Gospel. That’s what Cedarville cross country is all about. Our battle cry is “All for the glory of God” and that goes way beyond the cross country course. It goes to classes, to church, to the dorms, and to Chipotle after the race. Everything we do is worship of something and God is the only something worth worshiping. We run because God has blessed us with the ability to do it well and we can use that to send glory His way. This season meant nothing if it had no eternal impact. Ben’s All-American medal will probably end up in an attic or basement somewhere. It will get dusty and fade away. But the relationships we form with our competitors and teammates will last. The souls of every individual we raced this year and every fan that came to watch will live forever. If we made a positive difference in one of those souls over the course of this season, then everything we put into it was all worth it.
Thank you all for everything this season. Thank you for your support. We consistently draw the best crowds to our meets wherever in the country they are. I know for a fact that we had at least one family at every meet we ran this year and most meets it was much more than that. That kind of support is rare in college sports. Thank you for your prayers. We can’t do anything without God’s help and the thought of all of you bringing our requests before the throne is bone chilling. Thank you for your sons. I know most of you reading this are parents. Your sons are my brothers. They challenge me in every area of my life. I don’t know who I would be without them, but I know I wouldn’t be the same. Finally, thank you for reading. Writing the blog is kind of weird for me. I am a mechanical engineering major, not exactly the first choice for a blogger, but you have been great in putting up with my writing for two years now. I hope that the blogs have made you feel a little more involved with our team. Growing up almost every night in my house was spent in my parents’ bedroom where all of us kids would lay out the details of what was going on with our teams. Even now a big chunk of the time I spend with my family is spent updating them on what’s been happening with our team and getting updates on their teams. I hope I’ve been able to give you all a piece of that feeling of being intimately involved with our team. You may not be in the locker room or on the course with us every day, but I hope you all know that you are part of the CUXC family.
Remember that it’s ALL FOR THE GLORY OF GOD,
Tyler
Nov. 17, 2015Sophomore Track/Cross Country major (I wish) takes over the men’s cross country blog this week - that’s me, Daniel Michalski.
This past weekend was one for the books! However, it took a lot of physical and mental preparation to get there. Though we are all ecstatic for The Turtle - Ben Tuttle’s performance last weekend, most of us were coming off individual races that were less than our best at the NCAA II Midwest Regional meet. It was a mental battle just to regroup and focus on finishing the season well at NCCAA’s when we were striving the whole year to make NCAA DII nationals as a team in Joplin, Missouri. Coach made the call to have Ben recover and sharpen up for DII nationals and hold him out from NCCAA’s, so it was up to the rest of us to step it up and make up for not having our super-senior/grad student/frontrunner/captain to set the tone and lead the way as he does so well.
We all had to scramble on Thursday to get assignments in, take tests early, and run before we hit the road for New York. Leaving an extra day early was a blessing because that meant we could sleep in a little on Friday morning. After hitting up Perkins for lunch, we made the 50-minute drive from Olean, where our hotel was, to Houghton College’s "Field of Dreams" cross country course. There we absorbed cold and rain on a relaxed pre-meet run while some of our teammates ran in an unofficial open race.
Isaac Wheeler led the way in the open race, followed by Ethan Sullivan and Josh Perez. They had no one to race with other than each other, so it made for a mental battle. They still posted solid times for racing against the clock, without head-to-head competition to push them on. After their race, we all showered and spiffed up for the awards banquet in Houghton’s new indoor track facility. NCCAA leadership recognized several Cedarville athletes for Academic All-American honors (juniors and seniors with strong GPA’s).
During and after the banquet, snow began to fall at a good rate, but it needed some encouragement to stick. The drive back to the hotel had us a little nervous, though Coach O is an experienced UP Michigander driver. We had to get back for Matt Pelletier to take a final exam. Zac Bowen, Alex Shrock, and I spent the evening getting inspired to race fast by watching the Usain Bolt documentary, Fastest Man Alive. We went to bed in eager anticipation of a snowy race in the morning.
In the morning, the snow was gone, but the cold was still there, and we headed to the meet. It was great to see 2014 alum Matt Brooker and his family there to cheer us on. There was a different feel in the air before this meet. The temperature was brisk and we were relaxed and running smooth to get warm and ready to race. It was comforting knowing that we had yet another opportunity to race at the familiar eight-kilometer distance as opposed to the 10K at regionals. As we sharpened up with strides before the race, we all began to zero-in on our pre-race focus and hype, but I noticed that senior Forrest Thayer had a particularly strong focus hoping to finish his cross country career well.
Before we knew it, the gun went off and the race was underway. I got out with the leaders and we established a separation of three runners before the mile, which we came through in just under five minutes. Forrest was next and the rest of the guys packed up and stayed relaxed right behind him. Brothers Matt and Jud (CUTF/XC class of 2008) Brooker, Coach O, my dad, Mr. Bowen (photographer extraordinaire), Alex Shrock’s family, and the girls’ team were everywhere cheering for us! It was as good as a home meet with all the support we had! They specifically called out instructions to get with and pass two teams, which were our closest competitors: Dallas Baptist and Roberts Wesleyan. We knew that the team title was going to come down to one deciding factor: who could tough it out in the second half of the race.
After about three and a quarter miles, I started to hurt and fall off the leaders, just for the chase pack to overtake me too. However, I knew I had to be faithful to my teammates to finish strong and hold up my end of the bargain for us to succeed as a team. After rounding a tight turn, I was isolated in no-man’s-land and looked to my left only to see four Cedarville jerseys in a pack with some other competitors looking strong. I could not help but yell, "C’mon!" from across the course to a couple of them because I was so excited that they had stepped up so well! It was like wind in my sail, helping me to throw in a surge going into mile four. We were not just out running; we were having a competitive race! Wyatt Hartman, with about a quarter mile to go, came up on me and told me to take off and that there was a Roberts Wesleyan guy coming on me right up with him. That was a clutch cue for me to press with all I had for the finish, especially because I knew the team scores would be close. We both kicked down a few competitors in the final straight.
Both Dallas Baptist and Roberts Wesleyan had their top two finishers ahead of me, but our tight string of five runners all came in within 22 seconds, each one finishing sub-26:00, a goal we had not yet achieved this year. Five of our seven runners for the day set personal records - and Forrest’s near-50-second PR was most impressive, achieving sub-26:00 status for the first time after four hard years of diligent training! So much hard work culminated into our final race of this season, and Forrest’s collegiate career.
We are each thankful to the Lord for allowing us to see and reap the fruits of our training. It also has a bolstering effect to our confidence in Coach Orchard’s leadership to guide and mold us into better runners. It was a beautiful sight to see such a team effort; no flashy front running, no man left far behind. The dense finish earned us 61 team points with an average time of 25:44, also a season-best even without our top runner in Ben. Roberts Wesleyan was close behind with 68 points, and Dallas Baptist tallied 90. Our top four runners on the day: Zac, Matt, Wyatt, and I, earned NCCAA DI All-American honors by placing within the top 15 (15th, 14th, 11th, and 9th, respectively). We were freezing but giddy as schoolboys while we anticipated the awards ceremony to unleash our cheers and behold the banner - and most importantly to have the occasion officially documented with pictures on social media!
Thanks so much for following our team this season. Your well-wishing, cheering, spectating, encouraging, Facebook likes, and prayers have all contributed toward our success. Before and after every workout and race, all season long, we go to the Lord in prayer, asking his blessing on our work, seeking to glorify him through our abilities and efforts, and to echo the life-calling of I Corinthians 10:31, that it is "…All for the Glory of God!"
Go Jackets!
-Daniel Michalski
Nov. 10, 2015
BEN FREAKING TUTTLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
That’s all I could yell when I saw him coming around the back side of the course for the final time on Saturday. Last I’d seen him, he was battling with one other runner heading around behind the start line with 2K to go. Here, with less than 1/2 mile to the finish, Ben had opened up a 15-meter lead that continued to grow until he crossed the finish line before anyone else that had started the race 30 minutes and 35 seconds earlier. I was running and jumping like a giddy schoolgirl, yelling so hard that my voice still haven’t recovered as I write this.
It was the culmination of four and a half hard years of running, biking, and swimming for Ben, three of which I’ve had the privilege to watch and learn from. He’s struggled with injuries throughout his collegiate career, which is why he’s here as a medically redshirted fifth year senior. I’ve never met anyone who loves running as much as Ben. If cross country wasn’t a sport, he’d still be running ten or more miles a day just for the fun of it. It’s absolutely contagious and has inspired many of us currently on the team to take our mileage to levels we never dreamed possible. It’s also what has helped keep him stay focused through all the injuries, that and his relationship with God. Ben is also a spiritual leader on our team. He’s been a huge part of our Bible study for the last two years, gladly accepting a leadership and teaching role despite his natural quietness. Ben has done a tremendous job for the last two years of leading a group of young (some would say obnoxious and immature) underclassmen desperately in need of strong leadership. He’s the last member of the transition group that made the move from NAIA to NCAA II and qualified for two NCAA II national championships. Quietly, he’s become one of the best runners in Cedarville history by owning our 10K track record, running in four national championships, and now becoming the second Cedarville runner to win the NCAA II Regional. On and off the course, Ben has left his mark on our program and on every individual teammate he’s had and will be sorely missed after this year.
(I normally save tributes like that for my last post of the year, but it just seemed appropriate to do mine for Ben there.)
Six other guys ran at Regionals, too. Wyatt closed like a madman and improved his time from last year by nearly two minutes! Dan toughed out a hard race after starting too fast. Matt ran a super tough middle 5K, passing pack after pack of opposing runners and pulling our other guys along with him. Zac cramped up early on in the race but battled like a champ and probably passed ten or twenty guys in the last 400 (I was yelling for him to get 15). Shrocko was next, also running a great last 2K, doing all of the passing. Isacc was running his first ever 10k and pushed Shrocko during a big portion of the middle of the race. He closed like a beast, too.
As a team, we finished tenth for the second straight year. We came into the weekend unranked, so we improved on our ranking. Even though we finished in the same place last year, there was a world of difference between the two. This year’s region was so much tougher. We essentially put two guys ahead of our first last year, two more ahead of last year’s second, and another before last year’s third. We improved that much and didn’t even have our best day.
I couldn’t have been more proud of our guys this past weekend. Those that raced did so with a lot of heart and toughness. That was evident by the way they finished. Every one of them had looks of pure determination on their faces and forced their legs to submit to the will of their minds. That is pure toughness at its finest. The guys that didn’t race worked almost as hard as the guys that did. They spread themselves across the course and screamed their heads off. The guys racing didn’t run for 60 seconds without hearing a teammate’s voice. The support behind our guys racing was truly impressive, and the best that I saw at the meet (but I’m not biased).
Needless to say, it was a great weekend. I could go on, but this is getting really long and the Steelers game is now tied so my attention is becoming less and less about this and the writing quality is probably going down the drain. Next weekend we have the NCCAA National Championships in Houghton, NY. The top seven except Ben will run in that race, and a few guys might get to run in an open race on Friday. That will be our last race of the season as a team. Ben will run in Joplin, Missouri on November 21 at the NCAA II National Championship.
Remember that it’s ALL FOR THE GLORY OF GOD,
Nov. 5, 2015I’m not sure if whoever said that championships are won in the offseason ever played sports. Without a good offseason it’s impossible to compete at the highest level at the end of the season, so the saying has some validity. But, no amount of training ensures success. Channeling talent into performance on one given day isn’t always as easy as it seems. You have to get it done when it matters the most. It doesn’t matter how many mile repeats you can do or how fast you do a 20 mile long run, what matters is how fast you can run in the race.
Our season is coming to its peak this weekend at regionals. We aren’t quite at the championship level yet. We simply aren’t as good as some of the other teams in DII. For us, making it to nationals is our championship. To do that, we need to finish in the top five at regionals. The top two spots are pretty much out of the question. Grand Valley is ranked #1 in the nation and Southern Indiana is #7. After them, Wisconsin-Parkside is next strongest. The third spot is theirs to lose. After that, there are about ten teams that will be competing for those last two spots. Malone is currently ranked fourth in the region, and we weren’t far behind them at All-Ohio. Had Ben run at Lewis, we would’ve been in the mix with sixth-ranked Indianapolis.
What does all this mean? It’s going to be a dogfight. It will take our best day to qualify. Certainly out of that group of ten or so teams vying for those last spots, two will show up ready to run their best. Our job is to be one of those teams. Everything we do this week has an effect on the race, so we’ll be more careful how we eat, going to bed earlier, and preparing more mentally this week than any other week of the year. We’ve worked too hard for too long to hold back anything this week.
Don’t worry, as much as I’m talking about how focused we are on regionals, we’re still enjoying ourselves. This past weekend we went to the Michalski’s for our annual Halloween party. Whenever we’re all together, whether it’s at nightly dinner, playing eight player Halo, or on the bus to a meet, it’s a good time. This year has been a blast, but a trip to nationals would be the perfect icing on the cake.
Pray for us this weekend as we travel to Indiana and interact with all the other teams. As important as running is, we still recognize that we have a platform to share the Gospel and need to take advantage of that. If you’re anywhere near Evansville we’d love to see you out there cheering us on! If you can’t make it, I’m sure results are posted live somewhere on the NCAA website. If you can’t find them, just check in on our Facebook or Twitter profiles or check @CUJackets on Twitter. Those will probably all have results going out as soon as we know them.
Remember that it’s ALL FOR THE GLORY OF GOD,
Oct. 27, 2015Ever since I started running in seventh grade, there’s been a movement in cross country to flatter, straighter, faster courses. Everyone wants to run fast times and meet directors want to fit as many runners on the course as possible (more entries = more income) so there’s been a shift away from challenging courses to courses that are conducive to fast times and can hold lots of people. Luckily, God designed some parts of America where courses like that just can’t exist. Nestled in the West Virginia Appalachians is one of those places: Davis & Elkins College.
Crazy courses like D&E’s are great to run on because, for once, we don’t have to worry about time. So much of the focus of cross country (and track for that matter) is about how fast you run, not what place you get. Running a championship race on this course completely reversed that thinking. It was refreshing for the pressure of running a fast time to be lifted.
Though we entered the season having never lost a G-MAC title, we were voted by the coaches to finish second behind Trevecca. They say it’s hard to win a championship, but harder to win consecutive championships because once you’re on top everyone wants to knock you off. We felt that last year when Trevecca nearly upset us, only four points behind. This year we came in with more of a chip on our shoulder. We weren’t going to overlook them this year. We knew they were good and it would take strong performances from all of our guys to make it four in a row and a strong performance is what we got.
Ben won the race, smashing the course record, and we put eight in front of Trevecca’s fifth. Eleven of our guys finished in the top twenty. Instead of me quoting results, I’ll just refer you to the Yellow Jacket website for those. What you can’t see in the results is the toughness it took for our guys to finish where they did. This was the hardest course I’ve ever seen and it would’ve been really easy to lose it mentally and give up somewhere on those hills in the woods. More than any other team, our guys stayed tough mentally and that’s why we won as easily as we did. The depth of our team was proven as well. If we had entered our second seven finishers (8-14 on our team) as a separate team, they would’ve finished third. Not bad, having two of the top three teams in the conference all on the same team!
Two weeks from now is the big one. I’ll save my long discussion for next week, but all eyes now are on the Region meet in Evansville, Indiana. The whole team will continue training, but we can only run seven in that race. Who those seven will be has yet to be decided. We’ll take a few extra days easy to recover from the race this weekend and then have our last hard workout week of the year. As always, your prayers are greatly appreciated.
Remember that it’s ALL FOR THE GLORY OF GOD,
Oct. 21, 2015Fall is my favorite time of year. The air becomes crisp, the scenery becomes colorful, leaves crunch under your feet, you get to wear hoodies, and warm food and drink become more than just nourishment. It’s also the best time of year for sports. Football is in full swing, the MLB playoffs are going on, basketball is starting, and (most importantly for us) cross country is entering the post season.
We got a nice break from everything this past week. Fall Break meant no classes on Thursday or Friday and with no meet this weekend, we all (with the exception of Alec) headed home for a few days. The break couldn’t have come at a better time. This week it starts getting serious. With two (Lord willing three) meets left, it’s crunch time.
This weekend we travel to Davis & Elkins in West Virginia for the G-MAC Championship. We’ve never lost the G-MAC meet, but every year our margin of victory has diminished. Last year, we edged out Trevecca in a nail biter. Most of both teams returned this year, so we’re in for another dogfight. This race is all about competitive toughness. Man to man we have to want to win more than they do. But it’s also going to take some physical toughness to be successful this weekend. Davis & Elkins is smack dab in the middle of the Appalachian Mountains and their course is a beast. Narrow paths, roots, steep drop offs, and creek crossings highlight what looks like the most challenging cross country course I’ve ever seen. Certainly nothing like we’ve seen so far this year. But, I think our training in the gorges near campus have prepared us better than most for the kind of terrain we’ll encounter on Saturday. Personally, I can’t wait. Racing in circles around bean fields has been fun, but this looks like a blast. Times will be slow (the course record is over 27:00), but who cares? We’re there to race the other teams that are there and they have the same course to navigate. The final team score is all that matters in this one.
Pray for our travels this week. Some people don’t do well with the curvy roads of Appalachia. The last time we drove through West Virginia Jacob Walter came back about fifteen pounds lighter after vomiting Five Guys Burgers and Fries in some guy’s yard and a gas station trash can (haha, good times). We leave Friday morning and return Saturday night. Also pray for our injured. Zac is faced with the decision of whether to race this weekend or redshirt, Isaac had some foot problems last week, and I’m racing, but still not 100% healthy.
Remember that it’s ALL FOR THE GLORY OF GOD,
Oct. 13, 2015Trips are DAAAAAAA best. Every college athlete I’ve ever talked to says that trips with their team were one of their favorite parts of college. It’s such a special and unique experience that most college students don’t get. But despite all of the fun we get to have, there’s also an aspect of seriousness to our trips. Sure, trips are fun, but we’re there to run. It’s not a vacation it’s a meet. But for twenty guys who love cross country more than just about anything, what’s the difference?
We were a little crammed on the way there. The varsity bus has been in the shop all week so we made the drive to Chicago in two twelve-passenger vans. Though splitting the team up wasn’t ideal, I know my van still had plenty of laughs. We got to the course in the late afternoon for our run, after which some of the guys explored the Lewis University drainage system. From there we cleaned up at the hotel and got our first (really good) meal of the trip at Carrabba’s. It was already late by the time we got back, so after a quick team meeting most of us made our pre-race preparations and then went to bed.
The meet itself continued our season of tough competition. Four of the ranked teams from our region were there, including national #1 Grand Valley State. In this tough field, we took 7th. Dan won a t-shirt, finishing 13th in 25:11. Wyatt and Matt broke 26:00 for the first time and both cracked the Top 40. Isaac, Shrocko, Alec, Sullie, and JWool also ran PR's so for the second straight week the majority of the team PR'ed. It’s so rare for an entire team to improve at such a consistent rate; we’re pumped to keep pushing through the end of the season.
After the race we cleaned up at Lewis and drove into Chicago. Our first stop was lunch. We kicked off our Chicago experience with some cake shakes at Portillo’s. I’d never heard of a cake shake before, but now I have a new recipe in my dessert repertoire. Basically, take some chocolate ice cream, chocolate milk, and chocolate cake and put it in a blender (or a milkshake machine if you have one, I don’t in the dorm, though that would be awesome). Try it, it will change your life.
Next we went to the Chicago Marathon Expo. I’ve never been to an expo, and my first experience was, in a word, overwhelming. So many people who are so passionate (obsessed maybe?) about running in one place at one time. Wow. I was exhausted so walking around a giant convention center sounded terrible, but there were free samples so I did it anyways. If this sounds like a terrible experience, it was actually a lot of fun. We got some free stuff, some of the guys bought some stuff, and we got to hang out with and talk to a bunch of people who love running.
Next on the docket was what turned out to be a foot tour of downtown Chicago. I’m not sure exactly what the initial idea was, but we walked around downtown for about an hour before we finally ended up at “The Bean.” On the way we walked by Trump Tower, the marathon finish line, some random park, and a pretty sweet amphitheater. From there we went to dinner, or so we thought. We arrived at Lou Malnati’s Pizza and realized that we should’ve ordered ahead. Instead of waiting 2 1/2 hours we ordered at another location and picked it up on the way home. Family vacation style, we drove home eating our world famous Chicago deep-dish pizza (yeah, we ate REALLY WELL on this trip).
I could tell more stories from the trip, but this is already long enough as is. Stories will continue to be told in the months that follow (the good ones for years) just like they have from past trips. After our only back- to-back meets of the year we get a week off before travelling to West Virginia for the G-MAC meet two weeks from now. This will be our last really hard training week of the season heading into the postseason.
Remember that it’s ALL FOR THE GLORY OF GOD,
Oct. 7, 2015I love big crowds. It’s so cool to get a few thousand people together and have them all focused on the same thing at the same time. It’s electric. That kind of atmosphere often surrounds sporting events, and we had a doozy this past weekend. Nearly 700 men toed the line for the All-Ohio Championship. A few thousand lined the course. Right before the race I walked from our box on the start line out to where there was finally a break in the crowd where I could stand and I easily walked a quarter mile. Even though it was a regular season meet, there was a championship feel in the air. It was a great test for the guys to get the experience running in a race with that atmosphere before Regionals.
I don’t wear a watch and running around during the race I was worried that times were slow because it was windy and wet and to be honest it just kind of looked slow, but to my surprise it was a crazy fast day. Nearly all of our guys PR'ed or at least ran a course-best time. Ben was a beast out front, running with the leaders almost the whole way and broke 25:00. Dan was under 25:20 and Wyatt just missed breaking 26:00. Matt, Isaac, Forrest, Shrocko, and Sullie were all under 27:00. Gatchell was just over 27:00, Taves and Jimmy broke 28:00, and Brendan PR'ed by 2:00! What a day!
The only downer was that everyone else ran fast, too, so we took 13th overall and 4th in Division II, not exactly where we wanted to finish. It shows us that we still have a lot of work to do, and we know that. If we want to go to Nationals, that 3-7 pack needs to be mid 25's, not mid 26's, but this weekend was a huge step in the right direction. We needed a confidence booster and we just got it.
This week we make the quick turnaround for another meet on Saturday. It’s the only time all year we race on consecutive weekends. We’ll leave Friday morning and head up towards Forrest and Taves’ (I have no idea where that apostrophe should be!) houses in the Chicago area for a meet at Lewis University. Many of my best memories so far in college have come on cross country road trips (most of them have, actually) and I can’t wait to see what crazy memories we come back with from this weekend. More importantly, the team always comes back from a trip more unified. Only on the road do we get to have a blast and focus just on running. This will be an opportunity for us to focus on our mission before the postseason starts later this month.
Keep praying for our injured. David had to drop out of the race because of an ankle injury. Zac, Jared, and I didn’t race because of various injuries. Hopefully this weekend David and Jared will be back and I’ll be racing for the first time this year, too. We’re still waiting for an exact timeline on Zac, but he’s back to running some and we’re praying he’ll be back to racing soon.
Remember that it’s ALL FOR THE GLORY OF GOD,
Sept. 30, 2015Confidences are high heading into All-Ohio week. According to Isaac, “We are going to wreck All-Ohio on Friday.” While this might be a little ambitious, we are excited about our chances. This is setting up to be the largest cross country race in the history of the state of Ohio. There will probably be more than 600 runners in the race. For comparison, Friendship had 115 runners. Not only will there be a ton of runners, but there will be a lot of good runners. Ohio State is bringing their A team, Ohio, Miami, Cincinnati, Wright State, and Dayton are all Division I schools, and Malone and Walsh are both ranked in the region. It’s going to be fun.
Physically and mentally this was a good week for us to prepare for the season ahead. We managed to get three workouts in as many days this week, stepping up the speed and volume in preparation for the heart of our season. We’ll plan on a workout Monday and then rest up for the race on Friday.
On Saturday we made the 15 minute trip north to my house, where we enjoyed some football, music, and some home cooking with the women’s team. We’ve done this for three years now and it’s always a great time; a great opportunity to get off campus where no one was worried about school or running, which normally run (pardon the pun) our lives, just enjoying each other’s company. So often we get caught up in everything that’s going on and forget to slow down and enjoy life. We’re too busy doing things to actually enjoy the things that we’re doing. It was nice to have a chance to do that this weekend.
Continue praying for our injured. We are on the mend, but still not quite over the hump injury wise. If you’re anywhere near the Cedarville area, we race at 2 pm on Friday, we’d love to see you out there. If not, keep us in prayer as we have an incredible opportunity to represent Christ to everyone who will be here.
Remember that it’s ALL FOR THE GLORY OF GOD,
Sept. 24, 2015“There’s just something about it.” That’s the reason why the athletic training student zapping my achilles said she loves working cross country meets. I’d have to agree with her. There’s just something special about cross country meets and one of the best places I’ve ever seen that special something is Friendship. It’s the only meet I’ve ever been to where there are college, high school, and middle school races. As the day goes on, the runners get smaller, the races get shorter, and the paces get slower, but regardless of what race is happening, there are people running around screaming their guts out in an effort to make their runners go faster. Everyone out there is a die hard fan because, well, it’s cross country and there isn’t really any point in being a half-hearted fan.
We always get a great turnout for Friendship. Families come in for the race, we convince some of our friends and professors to come out, and year after year Lawlor schedules a football practice that morning and cheers us into the mile. This year’s meet had an extra special feel to it because the race was bigger and more important. Because our course is being used for the Horizon League meet later this year, several Horizon League teams that don’t normally participate came to scout out their conference course. We also had Trevecca and Ashland, two teams we’ll see later this season at Regionals, come for the first time. So, needless to say, the stakes were a little higher this year than in years past.
Despite the raised stakes, our guys kept their heads and ran smartly. Ben raced for the first time since last track season and led our team, though there’s a lot more in him once he gets his racing legs back. Dan had a good race, racing with Ben for almost the entire time. The rest of the guys ran in packs as well. Wyatt and Forrest both had encouraging races and Alec and Sullie seem to have made the transition from 5K to 8K without missing a beat. The team finished third behind Milwaukee and Ashland. As always, there’s room for improvement. If we want to go to nationals, we need to beat Ashland. But, we were only seven points back and didn’t run our best. Oh yeah, and did I mention they’re ranked fourth in our region and sixteenth nationally? It’s encouraging to see that even on not our best day we can be right in the mix with them, so imagine what we can do on our best day.
The other great part of Friendship is the platform that it gives us to share why we run. After the race we got a large group of athletes together for a group prayer and “All for the glory of God.” It’s neat to go out and compete hard and then after the race to join together and give credit where credit is due. We also got to cool down after the race with the guys from Trevecca. We have a small rivalry budding between our teams, but again, it’s awesome to lay it all out on the course to beat each other and then cool down together and share what God is doing in our lives. I heard it said once of rivalries, “You don’t hate the people, but you hate the uniform.” That’s such a great way of saying it. When we were racing, we wanted to beat everyone but we especially wanted black and purple (Trevecca’s uniforms are black and purple and Ashland’s are all purple), the uniform is all we see. After the race, we weren’t talking with black and purple; we were talking with Taylor, Ben, and Logan, fellow brothers in Christ.
Now we head into another off week. As much fun as Friendship is, it’s exhausting. Not only does an 8K just take it out of you, but working for the rest of the day and cleaning up afterwards makes you want to do nothing but lay on the couch and watch football (I actually almost missed dinner because I did that). Our bodies need time to rest, so we’ll grab as much rest out of the weekend as we can and get back at it next week. Last week started our speed training, so we’ll look to expand on that this week, increasing the volume now that we’re used to the increased speed.
Well, I’ve done enough rambling for one week and the football game I’m watching while writing this is getting really good. Continue to pray for our walking wounded. David is healing well, should be back to running soon. Jared has had a few nagging injuries that kept him from racing and there’s still no defined timeline for Zac’s return or mine. Thanks for all the support this past weekend. We don’t create that special atmosphere, you do.
Remember that it’s ALL FOR THE GLORY OF GOD.
Sept. 17, 2015I grew up playing basketball and during basketball season there was nothing better than having three or four games in a week. But, for cross country, it’s nice to have time off in between meets. Weeks off give time to recover and train. When we race, we go hard. There are no cupcake meets on our schedule; all of our meets present a challenge requiring our full physical and mental effort. Recovering from races takes at least three days, and preparing for a race takes at least two days, which would leave us with only enough time for one workout if we raced on consecutive weekends. We use training weeks in between our races so we can actually train and get better as the season progresses and enter the postseason fresh instead of racing ourselves to death.
This past week was one of those training weeks. It was also a very hot week, making the training difficult. I don’t know if you’ve ever tried it, but running almost as fast as you can for about five minutes and then resting for five minutes and then repeating four or five times is pretty difficult. It’s even more difficult when it’s ninety degrees and so humid that you start sweating just thinking about going outside. We had to adjust some of our workouts this week because of the heat, but we still ended up with a solid week of training. More than that, we are getting healthier! Jimmy and Dan are back to running full strength and I ran for the first time in two months. Soon, we’ll have the whole group running together.
This coming weekend we have the Friendship Invitational, our first home meet of the season. In the past, Friendship has been a fairly small meet, but, this year we have several more Division I teams coming and Trevecca, our top competition in the G-MAC, is also coming. So, this is no longer just a small race on our home course for everyone to get used to running 8K's again, this is a big invitational where we will be racing some major competition from Division I and two teams that we’ll see later in the year at DII Regionals. Kind of a big deal. But, the guys are staying loose and calm because Coach O keeps reminding us that we can’t control the other teams, we can only control what we do, and if we do things right and run fast, good things will happen.
Please continue to pray for the injuries that we do have: Zac, Jared, and I are still hurt to some degree or another. Also pray for us this weekend as we compete. Friendship offers us the unique opportunity to play host to not only other colleges, but high school and middle school teams as well. We want to be good hosts and represent Christ well with the platform we have. And if you’re free Saturday morning, come out to the course and cheer us on! A Saturday morning cross country meet makes the perfect start to the day before watching college football all day. Trust me, I’ve been doing it since middle school.
Remember that it’s ALL FOR THE GLORY OF GOD,
Sept. 8, 2015You never know what to expect from the first meet of the season, which is weird because I’ve been around cross country for nine years now, and Coach O has been doing this longer than I’ve been alive; but, somehow, the first race always seems to come up with some surprises. There’s so much unknown going into the first race. For the freshmen, there’s a whirlwind of emotions leading up to their first collegiate race. For the upperclassmen, there are the expectations that come with a new season. Everyone is thinking back over their summer training, wondering if they did enough and how it will show itself on the course. Because of all the unknowns surrounding the first race, we scheduled a small 5K as our first race. Normally, our races are 8K, but starting the season with a 5K gives us a chance to get a race under our belts without destroying our bodies.
With all that in mind, we started our season with the Dayton Flyer 5K. We were hoping for nice conditions with a morning race, and it looked like we were going to get them when we arrived. But in the hour before the race while we warmed up, the temperature rose from 68 and cool to about 80 and humid. The heat was definitely a factor as times were slow from top to bottom. That’s not to say we didn’t have good performances. Dan Michalski finished seventh, breaking 16:00 for the first time, Matt Pelletier cracked the top 30, and Alec Weinhold had a great first collegiate race, finishing 30th in 16:35.
Now that our first race is behind us, we are looking ahead to a hard week of training. The next meet isn’t for two weeks, so we have the next week and a half to go hard and get better. We’re just beginning to enter the faster phase of our training. Last week was the first mile repeats workout, so there’s more of those and maybe some 1000's or something of that sort in our near future. Those workouts really bring times down, so I’m excited to see the improvement we make over the next two meets. Most teams are several weeks into their intense training, so we’re itching to get another shot at teams that beat us on Saturday when we’re on more of an even training ground.
Friday night at the Michalski’s house we enjoyed a great time of food, sting pong, and JOHN CENA as a team. Nights like that are bringing our team closer and closer together. We’re becoming a tighter knit group, which will only help us on race day.
Continue to pray for our health; we had six guys not run on Saturday for some reason or another. Most of our injuries seem to be nearing their end, so with a lot of prayer, hopefully we can have a full team racing at Friendship.
Remember that it’s ALL FOR THE GLORY OF GOD!
Sept. 3, 2015Wow! I can’t believe we’ve already been back on campus for nearly three weeks. I mean, I can. We have. In some ways it feels as if we’ve been here longer, yet in other ways it feels like we just got here. Oh, well. We’re here, back together as a team and that’s all that matters.
Before I continue further, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Tyler Greenwood, and you’re stuck with me for a second year of blogging. I’m a junior mechanical engineering major, which basically means I have no qualifications to be the team blogger, but I’ll do my best to keep you updated on our team as the year goes on. I’m from Springfield, Ohio and love food, sports, and sleep, in no particular order.
Well, now that my introduction is over, I can introduce our freshmen. This year we have joining us Jimmy Barton, Ethan Gatchell, Brendan Orchard (yes, he’s related to our beloved Coach Orchard), David Pelletier (yes, he’s related to our not quite as beloved Matt Pelletier), Ethan "Sullie" Sullivan, Matt Taves, Alec Weinhold, and Josh Woolverton. So we now have two Matts, two Pelletiers, two Joshes, two Ethans, and an Alec and an Alex. As someone who’s awful with names, let me tell you that the first week was miserable trying to get those down, but now that we’re three weeks in I’ve got it pretty good. Oh yeah, and we have Ben "Turtle" Tuttle rejoining us for his fifth year as a freshman in the Masters of Ministries program. Since we only lost three from last year, this year’s team is a lot bigger, which is a ton of fun.
Having the team back together is such a blessing for us. Unlike many sports teams, who have mandatory camps and workouts throughout the summer, we go our separate ways for three months. Some of the guys were able to get together this summer, but I wasn’t so lucky. I spent much of the summer in the Maine wilderness just a few miles from Canada. On my drive back, I got a call from Isaac Wheeler and, as good as it was being in Maine and as good as the relationships that I formed there were, I was filled with joy just hearing the voice of one of my teammates.
The bond formed between teammates is something that really can’t be explained. Working as hard as we do day in and day out side by side with other men forges a bond that goes deeper than mere friendship. Our bond is held together by the literal blood, sweat, and tears that have been poured out with and for the other guys on the team. The other cornerstone for our team is the knowledge that we are all running and living for the same purpose. We seek to glorify God in everything we say and do. That’s what our team is about. We want to be fast, and we will do everything in our power to make that happen; but we also want to be men of God, and that takes first priority. So, we get to be teammates for a few hours a day for a few years on the course, but we also get to be teammates for twenty four hours a day forever in life, and that’s pretty cool.
So how’s the team looking this year? Well, I’m glad you asked. I’m super excited for this season. We are healthier right now than we’ve been in nearly two years. We have an absurd amount of talent that is ready to burst, so we’re setting our sights high. Last year we missed out on going to NCAA II Nationals, so returning and doing some damage there is our ultimate goal, but along the way we have some important meets in the All-Ohio and G-MAC. Both present unique challenges that will help prepare us for Regionals. Right now the most important meet on our mind is the UD Flyer 5K on Saturday. The first meet of the year is always exciting as we’ve been itching to get back to racing all summer long.
Obligatory team updates: graduated senior Matt Cheney married Rachel McKinley in May, recent grads Joe and Jasmin Niemiec are now parents, and our very own sophomore Josh Perez married Nicole Watterud.
Please be praying for our injured: I haven’t run in almost a month due to achilles tendonitis, Jimmy Barton is recovering from a twisted ankle, and Dan Michalski and Zac Bowen are still running, but dealing with some nagging injuries. Also pray for our team as we represent Christ in Dayton this weekend.
Remember that it’s ALL FOR THE GLORY OF GOD,
Tyler Greenwood is a junior at Cedarville University from Springfield, Ohio and majoring in mechanical engineering.
