It is really getting down to it in the UA The Freshman/FloFrosh race. On the women’s side, Laura Hoer of N.C. State put her name at the top of the list back on September 25th by winning Griak and continued to hold her front-running status this weekend. She ran down Florida State’s Pasca Cheriyot to win the individual ACC crown by a mere second. She also beat last year’s NCAA runner-up Kendra Schaaf in the process. At the Big Ten Championships, Emily Sisson of Wisconsin continued to show vast week-by-week improvements by placing 3rd. Being only 9 seconds back from champion Emily MacLeod of Michigan State shows vast progress from her opener just 4 weeks ago. With 3 weeks to NCAAs, Sisson will look to close the gap on Hoer. Elsewhere, there were close battles for the top frosh conference honors. At Big East, Georgetown’s Madeline Chambers took the top spot in 8th, just three spots ahead of Villanova’s Emily Lipari in 11th. Across the country at Pac 10s, Katie Flood of Washington came on strong in the late stages of the race to nab 6th as the top freshman with Stanford’s Jessica Tonn less than 3 seconds back in 8th. Flood was hindered by injury in the summer and early fall, so watch her fitness to continue to improve. Marielle Hall of Texas, who came on strong at the Pre-National meet leading Texas surprisingly did not score for the Longhorns at Big 12s.

On the men’s side, we saw a few great freshman battles. At the ACC meet, Florida State’s Jakub Zivec and North Carolina’s Jake Hurysz flipped positions from their close finish at Pre-Nats. Zivic ran 24:07 for 11th as Hurysz was 14th 24:10. Both were their team’s 3rd man as FSU won and UNC finished 3rd. Clemson was led by freshman Ty McCormack, who was right behind Hurysz in 15th (24:12). At the Pac 10 meet, Parker Stinson of Oregon and the rest of the ducks went out hard on the muddy course, while Erik Olson and the Stanford 4-7 pack hung back and picked people off. It worked in Olson’s favor as he finished 11th as the top freshman and 6th man on the winning team, while Stinson faded to 34th at Oregon’s 7th. At the Big 12, Champions Oklahoma State seemed to sit their top freshman, Matt McElroy, who hasn’t raced since the opener on September 25th. His teammate Shane Moskowitz raced in the Cowboy uniform for the first time, placing 33rd as their 7th man. The top frosh honors went to Texas’ Ryan Dohner who finished in 20th. He again led the team this season as the first Longhorn across the line.

 

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