By Peter Keiper-White
Sports Editor

While neither squad ran as well as it had hoped, both the men’s and women’s cross country teams turned in solid finishes at the Open New England meet Friday in Boston.

The Open New England meet is different than other meets that the teams compete in because it involves schools from all NCAA Divisions, not just Division III.

"It can be very intimidating, especially for a young team like ours," said J.R. Gaige, head coach. "This is a very large meet and we are competing against Division I schools and that is something that they haven’t experienced yet."

The women’s team finished 22nd out of 42 teams and placed 8th out of 18 Division III schools. Individually, Catlin Converse ’03 led the way with a time of 19:16, good for 103rd overall. Veena Reddy ’00 was right behind Converse with a time of 19:26

"We didn’t run as well as we had hoped," Gaige said. "Sometimes you have to have a meet [where you don’t run your best] before you can really succeed."

"We were really intimidated by the size of the meet," said Julie Holt ’02. "We didn’t run in packs like we usually do, so it was everyone out there running for themselves and that threw us off."

The men’s team came in 33rd out of 39 teams and 13th of Division III schools. While they did not enjoy much success overall, individually there was a lot of improvement.

Dan Lazarek ’02 led the Cardinals with a time of 26:20, a full 80 seconds better than his time at this meet a year ago. Mike Fox-Boyd ’01 finished second on the team. His time of 26:54 was 53 seconds better than his mark here last season.

"I warmed up a lot better this year," Lazarek said. "I did a lot of jogging and a couple turnover drills beforehand to get my heart rate up and then built up that momentum during the race."

"Dan and I worked off each other for the first few miles and then we just went to work," Fox-Boyd said. "You’re a certain percentage as good as your training this year and a certain percentage as good as your training last year. I’ve been training under J.R. for two years now and it is starting to pay off."

Next up for Wesleyan is the Little Three meet, hosted by Williams College.

"Williams and Amherst are two of the best teams in New England," Gaige said. "We are more concerned with individual performances than overall team scores."

"We need to have a brawl against Williams and Amherst this weekend," Lazarek said. "We have a large team by cross country standards so I think we could come out on top in a fight. In a race, however, as far as the actual race is concerned, I don’t like our chances."