The Cal Poly men’s cross-country team finished in 28th place with 680 points last Monday at the NCAA Cross-Country Championships in Terre Haute, Ind.
On the women’s side, individual qualifiers Leanne Fogg and Meghan Breadmore finished 105th and 146th, respectively, at the championships.
After finishing in a surprising third place at the NCAA West Regionals, the men struggled on Monday, placing only one of their seven runners in the top 100. The performance was a product of several uncontrollable variables such as travel, weather and fatigue, head coach Mark Conover said. He is still happy with the result, though.
“Trying to sustain that level of competitiveness they achieved at regionals was certainly a tall order for them and that showed in the results, but I’m not complaining,” Conover said. “They have a lot to be proud of, finishing 28th in the nation. It’s certainly a very commendable and noteworthy achievement.”
Senior Daniel Gonia, Cal Poly’s top finisher, placed 100th overall and covered the 10k course in 30 minutes and 47 seconds. He was followed by junior David Cardona, who finished 121st with a time of 30 minutes and 57 seconds. Crossing the line third for the Mustangs was sophomore Chris Frias, clocking in at 31:47 in 199th place.
Gonia said the Mustangs were heavily worn down from running in the regional championships only nine days earlier — they received an automatic bid to the national championships in the meet by placing third.
“I had pretty high expectations going into it,” Gonia said. “It was just a really tough week. I feel like the (regionals) really took a lot out of us. We were racing against teams that were fresher, that didn’t put so much on the line a week earlier. They came out and were able to roll a lot quicker and responded to the speed a lot better than we did.”
For redshirt senior Gonia, it was his final race in a Mustang uniform — he has fulfilled his eligibility and will not compete in track and field in the spring. The meet had more meaning to it than usual, Gonia said, but in the end he wasn’t completely satisfied with his performance.
“It was pretty surreal,” he said. “It made me drive a little harder and I was aware of what was at stake the entire time. It forced me to go out hard, but unfortunately, I wasn’t able to respond the way that I was prepared for it.”
Big West conference champion Chad Hall of UC Riverside finished 44th overall on the day. Hall out-kicked Gonia by less than a second for both the conference crown and West Regional bragging rights in their previous two head-to-head matchups.
Wisconsin won the team title while freshman Lawi Lalang of Arizona won the individual championship finishing in a time of 28:41, 13 seconds ahead of the second-place runner.
For the women, senior Fogg covered the 6K course in a time of 21:04, good enough for 105th overall. Cal Poly’s only other participant in the meet was true freshman Breadmore who crossed the line 146th in 21:22.
Fogg and Breadmore are the first women to represent Cal Poly in the Division I NCAA championships in school history.
“It was a good effort,” Fogg said. “It was quite the experience. Neither of us has been in a race running against so many girls of that caliber so it was a surprise, but I think we handled it well.”
Along with Gonia, the championship race marks Fogg’s final appearance in a cross country meet at the collegiate level.
“I didn’t have a really outstanding race, but it was a race where I ended my cross-country season on a good note,” Fogg said.
Fogg also said her teammate, Breadmore, has a bright future in collegiate running and said with experience she will consistently vie for a spot in the championship race in the years to come. Breadmore crossed the line as the 19th fastest freshman finisher on the day.
Senior Shelia Reid of Villanova out-kicked former local talent junior Jordan Hasay of Oregon crossing the line first in the women’s race in 19:41, winning her second national championship. Georgetown won the women’s team title with 162 points.
“It was a historic year,” Conover said. “The women made it to the national championships for the first time ever. We had a men’s team that was completely off the radar, but they believed in themselves and believed they could be a national championship team. At the end, they held through and stayed with the plan and got back on top of the winner’s stand at conference.”