ETSU’s men’s and women’s cross country teams raced in the Live in Lou XC Classic on Saturday, Oct. 2.
Live in Lou was a bigger race than the ones that have been run so far this semester, with 44 women’s teams and 36 men’s teams.
“When you go out in this huge pack in a really big race, it’s a lot more competition, and there’s always so many people to chase,” said sophomore Kiera Snyder (Clyde, Mich.).
Snyder set a personal record in her previous race with a time of 17:47.74 with hopes of setting a new one in Louisville.
“I’m really excited to see if I can improve on that,” said Snyder. “It’s been a good season so far.”
Also setting a personal record in the previous race, junior Myles Stoots (Mobile, Ala.) took 38 seconds off of his 8K race time. In Louisville, Stoots finished the race with a new best of 24:47.6.
Overall, in the race in Louisville, eight Buccaneers ran new personal bests. Sophomore Gavin Cooper (LaFollette, Tenn.), sophomore Josh Krasfur (Fort Collins, Colo.), freshman Wiliam Hardig (Radford, Va.), freshman Jordan Thomas (Knoxville, Tenn.), freshman Dylan Zeller (Hixon, Tenn.), senior Brayden Hamblen (Rock Falls, Ill.), senior Matt Scarr (Wambersal, NSW, Australia) and Stoots.
“Part of the season you might train one way, and as the season progresses, you try to move the training up a little bit,” head coach George Watts said. “We are moving along where I’d like us to be. We are as prepared as we can be.”
The men finished the day placed 10th of 36 teams while the women placed 28th of 44.
“From the beginning of the season, one thing I told both men’s and women’s teams is that we are really trying to focus on the conference championship and the NCAA South Regional championship,” said Watts. “We are really training and gearing up for those meets. I hope we’ll be at our best.”
