Following a bye week away from competition, the Texas A&M men’s and women’s cross country teams travelled to Missouri for the Gans Creek Classic on Oct. 3.
Paced by redshirt freshman Teddy Radtke in sixth place, the men’s team finished with five in the top-10 and placed second overall behind Missouri. On the women’s side, the Aggies placed fourth with three top-25 finishes. The No. 1 Arkansas women’s team placed first in impressive fashion, taking eight of the top-10 places.
“I thought the men executed the race really well,” coach Wendel McRaven told 12thman.com. “The beginning of the race started out aggressive, they weren’t that far off from the front and they didn’t put themselves in a stupid position. They were kind of hanging back a little bit running together and to go through 5k with six guys within a second of each other is pretty impressive team running. They’re starting to develop their identity as a team, that’s good.”
With team leader junior Eric Casarez out due to a minor injury, Radtke had the highest finish for the Aggies. Radtke completed the race with a 1,000-meter split of 2:53.8 and moved up three places, giving him the fastest final split of the race.
“Teddy [Radtke] continues to really impress me. A year ago he was really a non-entity and a year later now as a redshirt freshman to be leading the charge and to finish as well as he did I don’t think he knows how good he could possibly be.” McRaven told 12thman.com.
On the women’s side, McRaven said starting each race aggressively will be something the team continues to work on in preparation for its next meet.
“Overall I think the women didn’t get out aggressively enough and that is something we’ve talked about and will continue to work on,” McRaven told 12thman.com. “Grace [Plain], Abbey [Santoro] and Julia [Black] all closed really well but they have to be a little bit more aggressive, if they are three to five seconds faster at the first 1,000-meter then it is a completely different outcome for the race.”
Plain was one of the trio of juniors who finished in the top-25 for the A&M women. With a 16th place finish of 21:21.0, she had the highest finish on the team.
“For her first race of the season, I thought Grace [Plain] did a nice job,” McRaven told 12thman.com. “She ran with the group early, felt good and just continued to move up.”
Plain recorded a 3:33.6 split at the halfway point, boosting her from 27th place to 20th before a 3:29.1 final split propelled her to finish within the top-20.
“I surprised myself, I felt really strong and good,” Plain told 12thman.com. “Even though it has been awhile since I’ve raced, I kept reminding myself that I’m fit and I’ve done the training. The strength of our team is being able to run together and know that I have my teammates, if someone else is feeling bad then we will lift each other and get through it together.”
The A&M cross country team will have another bye week before seeing familiar foes at the first home meet of the season, the third annual Arturo Barrios Invitational on Oct. 17 at the Watts Cross Country Course.
“We’ll get a test in two weeks at home with teams from the Big 12 in the mix and we’ll see Arkansas men again, it’ll be a barn burner at home,” McRaven told 12thman.com.