Shelby Bradley | Sports Co-Editor

Friday, September 11, the Buena Vista University (BVU) men and women’s cross country teams showed exceptional performances at their home invite located at the Sunrise Pointe Golf Course.

The Beaver men took 3rd place out of three with North Iowa Area Community College (NIACC) placing first and Martin Luther placing second. Despite coming in last overall, senior Alex Lamp finished top five in the meet while junior Ben Sampson finished top ten.

“Overall it was a pretty good race. The plan was to start off a little slower and work on the back half of the race, and that’s exactly what I did,” Lamp said. “During a race when I start to get tired, I need to work on staying focused and pushing through the race.”

Head cross-country and track and field coach Ryan Schroeder was pleased with Friday night’s performances on both ends. Schroeder believes the men’s team needs to continue working on getting health and fit.

The women’s team finished 2nd of four with NIACC coming in first. The women had very strong showings from freshman Katie Puls and sophomore Sybbie Sears coming in 2nd and 5th respectively.

“I thought my performance went really well, better than expected,” Puls said. “I was really proud of the whole team for fighting through until the end, everyone did such a great job.”

With this only being both teams’ second meet, there is plenty of room for improvement.

“Both team have been working hard and really trusting the training. That’s going to help us big time come the end Championship season,” Schroeder said.

The Beavers’ next meet is Saturday, Sept 26 at the Griak Invite in Falcon Heights, Minnesota.

Photos by Taylor Staab