Men take fifth, women sixth as host of HL?championships
John Fisher
Issue date: 11/4/09 Section: Sports
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For such an important race, one would have hoped for better weather conditions.
"The guys who ran well, it bothered them a little bit, and the guys who didn't do so well, it probably bothered them more," said coach Guy Murray.
Temperatures were in the low 40s, made worse by strong winds and occasional rain.
"I thought we ran okay today," Murray said. "We thought we could be in the mix for the third or fourth spot, and we ran okay, but just not good enough."
Butler was the clear favorite entering the race, and did not disappoint, winning both the men's and women's races and finishing with a perfect score of 15 on the men's side and an outstanding score of 21 for the women.
Titan junior Pat Liederbach, who has dealt with injuries all season, led the way for the Titan men, finishing with 126 points. Liederbach came in 10th overall with a time of 26:11 and received All-League honors for the third straight year, finishing on the second team.
"I did alright, but my legs have been pretty tired the past couple weeks, so I had to deal with that during the race," Liederbach said. "The weather made the race tougher for everybody and hurt everyone's time a little bit, but I don't think it affected (the end results) too much. I wasn't where I wanted to be, but I wasn't too far off."
The men's team as a whole did well in the race.
Sophomore Alex Vanias finished in 18th place with a time of 26:59. Senior Alex Gould finished strong at 28:07 and sophomore Erik Westbrook did likewise at 28:17. Following them were junior Matt Mahler at 28:27 and sophomore Bob Radlich at 28:30.
The women's team also had a strong finish, with 146 points.
"The girls did what they needed to do today," said Murray. "I am pretty excited. We have a lot of freshmen, so hopefully we can keep it up next year. But for today I thought we ran par for the course."
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