Members of the Wayne State College cross country team will be moving in on Tuesday, August 13 after doing some personal training over the summer.
After graduating several seniors last year and losing some upperclassmen, the Wildcat women’s cross country team will be made up of 11.
Marlon Brink will be starting his 25th year leading Wildcat cross country.
Coach Brink said summer workouts were sent out.
“The most important thing really for them over the summertime is to build their base milage up so they’ve got a good aerobic fitness level,” said Brink. “Then when they get here we still got a fair amount of time before we really get to focusing on a lot of speed and racing and stuff like that.”
Taylor Thorp will be the lone senior for the WSC women’s cross country team.
Coach Brink also added a couple underclassmen that could step into the top seven runners.
“We got a young lady from Blair, NE her name is Allison Czapla,” Brink added. “She was the women’s winner in the Chicken Days 5K run this summer…I got another young lady from the state of Washington, Kaitlyn Bloomenrader. She is more of a middle distance runner but I think she’ll move up to the cross country distance and do alright there.”
WSC women’s cross country will look towards Callie Kirchner, Sydney Escritt and Madeline Kunz. Kirchner made the finals of 1500-meter run last year at the NSIC Outdoor Championships, Escritt dropped her time in the 5K as did Kunz.
Other top runners could be Jozlyn Barnes and Maelee Beacom.
Five of the top seven runners graduated on the Wayne State College women’s cross country team.
Augustana University, University of Mary, Winona State and Minnesota Duluth will provide top competition for the NSIC women’s races.
“Last year, our women’s team was ninth,” Brink mentioned. “I think if everything goes well and we stay healthy and some of these younger girls get the experience they need we might have a shot in improving on our placement last year and hopefully beak in the top half there.
Along with getting some long runs in, Wayne State College cross country will start to incorporate speed.
The 2024 season will open with the Augustana University Twilight meet on Friday, Sept. 6. The women’s race will begin at 8:30 p.m. followed by the men at 9 p.m.
Wayne State College will also be hosting the Wildcat Classic on Saturday, Sept. 28 at 10/10:45 a.m.
A handful of teams have already signed up.
“It’s a challenging course because there’s rolling hills,” said Brink. “It’s not really a flat course, it kind of always deceives people a little bit when they first see it. It’s a good course to race on and that’s our only home meet this year.”
Next year, Wayne State College will host the NSIC Championships.
WSC cross country officials are excited to get the group together and just have a chance to push each other in practice.
“Every year you kind of have a little bit different team chemistry,” Brink added. “I think with having quite a few new faces on the team this year, that’s going to add some excitement to it. But we’re excited to get some new athletes on the team into here and the returners back to help kind of lead the way and set the tone for everybody.”
