ST. BONIFACIUS, Minn. – The Gustavus men’s and women’s cross country teams headed to Crown College on Saturday morning for the Crown Invitational. Both teams had a strong showing as the women took first place of two teams and had 10 of the top 11 runners, and the men finished in second out of four teams and had five of the top 13 runners.
The Gustie women were led on the course by Lotus Schifsky (Sr., Prescott, Wis.) who came in with a time of 20:49.86 and finished first overall in the meet. Kourtney Kulseth (So., New Richland, Minn.), Gabriela Passmore (So., Mapleton, Minn.), Iliana Ramon (Fy., Fairmont, Minn.), and Sarah Anderson (Jr., Roseville, Minn.) rounded out the top five for the Gusties, all finishing with times under 22 minutes.
When asked about the performance of the women, head coach Brenden Huber stated, “We looked a lot stronger this week which was great to see. We tried a different approach and the ladies responded well to it. It was fun to watch them working together and pushing each other.”
On the men’s side the Gusties were led by senior captain Alex Wischnack (Sr., Norwood, Minn.) who came in fourth place overall with a time of 16:56.30. Jack Degonda (Fy., Marine on St. Croix, Minn.) and Casey Olson (So., Harmony, Minn.) each finished in the top 10 overall as well, posting times of 17:13.85 and 17:24.06, respectively.
“We had some awesome efforts from our guys today,” said Huber. “We had some tough competition which was great, because we got to see how well we measure up to others at this point. We have a few of our top guys out right now so seeing the ‘next one up’ mentality from some different runners was fantastic.”
The next meet for the Gusties will be September 15th, when both teams will head to Bloomington, Minnesota for the Augsburg Invitational.