While the Tigers men’s cross country team is looking to reclaim the throne at the top of the AUS conference, the women’s squad will look to collect their seventh consecutive conference title this weekend.
After the DAL/SMU Invitational had to be cancelled due to Hurricane Dorian touching down in Halifax, the team travelled to Antigonish to the StFX Cross Country Invitational for the first meet of the season.
Fifth-year transfer Catherine Thompson emerged as the Tigers top finisher in the race, placing third, while first-year runners Emily Hamilton and Renata Kingston were not far behind her in fifth and sixth-place respectively.
The women’s team finished in second place behind StFX, while the men were victorious by a narrow margin over the host team thanks to a fourth-place finish from Jonathan Goodridge in his first race as a Tiger. Hudson Grimshaw-Surette had a strong performance to cross the line sixth, while Jacob Halloran and rookie Daniel Rosen were able to finish inside the top 10 in eighth and ninth.
The strong performance of the women’s team was enough to move them into the U SPORTS Top-10, sitting in the 10th place spot.
In the first 8km race of the season for the women’s team, the Tigers travelled to Montréal for the AUS/RSEQ Interlock race hosted by l’Université de Montréal.
Once again Catherine Thompson was the top finisher for the Tigers in 13th place while Emily Hamilton was just a few seconds behind her in 20th. Rounding out the point scorers for the Tigers were Jessica Needham (30th), fifth-year UPEI transfer Emma Moore (46th), Renata Kingston (47th), first-year Lauren Lowther (50th) and fifth-year Kamylle Frenette (56th).
The Tigers were able to battle to a sixth-place team finish in a very tough group that included three of the top five schools in the U SPORTS Top 10. Most importantly, the Tigers were the top AUS team in the final competition in preparation for the conference championship.
Once again battling it out against StFX for the top spot from the AUS, the men’s team finished just six points behind the X-Men to come fourth overall as a team. Similar to previous years, the Tigers showed great depth on the men’s side, with seven runners finishing within 16 places.
Nick Robertson had a great performance for the Tigers at the Interlock to cross the line in 27th, while rookie Will Cox finished right after him in 28th. Â Rounding out the squad for the Tigers were Jacob Halloran (31st), Jonathan Goodridge (34th), fifth-years Callum Drever (35th) and Mike Rogers (38th), and third-year Hudson Grimshaw-Surette (43rd).
Looking ahead to the AUS championship, the women’s team will have a lot of new faces in black and gold at the starting line, but most have been there before under different colours. The experienced group has shown they are able to perform in big meets like the Interlock, which carries over greatly to their chances of a seventh-consecutive title. The men will be in for a tough fight, as they have been all year. With the impressive depth that they have, if one or two of the Tigers top seven are able to put up a big performance, it could make the difference between bringing home the banner or not.
All of that will be decided this Saturday, as the Tigers hit the trails at the Kingswood Resort in Hanwell, NB, hosted by the University of New Brunswick Reds. The women race at 12pm, followed by the men at 12:45pm.