ROCK ISLAND, Ill. — The Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) men's cross country team shined across two major meets today, with the No. 11 nationally ranked Engineers turning in a strong effort at the Augustana Interregional Invitational and a dominant team title at the Western New England Golden Bear Invitational.
Evan Lacey led the Engineers at Augustana with a 24th-place finish in the DIII Gold 8K field, clocking a final time of 24:52.4. He ran an opening mile in 4:54.1 and reached the 4K mark at 12:25.4, holding a strong pace before closing with a 7:30.8 final segment.
Tobin Durham followed close behind in 32nd place at 25:03.5, staying consistent through the middle of the race with splits of 12:23.1 at 4K and 17:17.9 at 5.6K.
Jack Loughery (41st, 25:11.9) and
Colin Goldschmidt (45th, 25:15.4) rounded out the top four for RPI in the top 50.
Rounding out the top seven scorers were
Dom Pena (56th, 25:27.6),
Jack Czarnecki (58th, 25:28.5), and
Thomas Manson (80th, 25:44.6), all finishing within a minute of each other.
Brady Geisler (121st, 26:05.0),
Tevin McLaren (126th, 26:07.1), and
Justin Cascio (156th, 26:20.4) also turned in competitive efforts.
Competing at Western New England, RPI's depth was on full display as 14 runners placed in the top 20, propelling the Engineers to a commanding first-place team finish out of 19 squads.
Gwilym Horner paced the team with a runner-up finish in 25:23.42, with
Danny Gall (25:41.63) and
Nathaniel McKee (25:41.70) crossing just behind in third and fourth.
Tyler Husar followed in fifth place at 25:43.79, and
Samuel Gunther (7th, 25:52.71) rounded out the first five finishers for RPI.
Anthony Zarrella (8th, 25:56.10),
Evan Morrow (9th, 25:57.16), and
Nick McAuley (11th, 26:11.06) continued the string of Engineers across the finish line. Joe Nuzzo (12th),
Murray Copps (14th),
Sam Gibbons (15th),
Tyler Sinkins (17th),
Walter Day (18th), and
Andre Latina (19th) all finished under 26:47 to complete a powerful showing for the Engineers.
RPI will take the next weekend off before setting their sights on the Liberty League Championship in Saturday, November 1 in Potsdam, NY.
