The Oregon Ducks won the NCAA cross-country championship this fall.
In track and field, almost all cross-country runners also run distance races for the track team, which means the Gophers distance runners have a tough weekend in front of them.
The Gophers men’s track team travels to Oregon this weekend to take part in the Pepsi Invitational, along with Penn State and the University of Washington. The meet starts at 12:20 p.m. Saturday and runs all day.
The Ducks dominated the cross-country championships, with five runners finishing in the top 30. Minnesota, which took eighth, placed just one.
True-freshman Hassan Mead will be running his first collegiate 5000-meter outdoor race at the meet.
“I think he’s ready to run with those guys,” assistant track coach and head cross-country coach Steve Plasencia said. “He’ll have some really tough competition out there, but I have no reservations about putting him in there against anybody.”
Mead was one of the top cross-country runners for the Gophers this season, placing second at both the Big Ten championships and the NCAA Midwest Regionals.
During the indoor track season, Mead specialized in the 3000-meter race, posting the team’s top three times.
“Hassan has been a great surprise this year,” head track coach Phil Lundin said. “He’s really made everyone get better by having as much success as he has.”
It will be a homecoming, of sorts, for Mead, who lived with his uncle in Seattle for three years.
“I love the West Coast,” Mead said. “The weather is a lot more like the weather back in Somalia.”
Other notable distance runners are Chris Rombough, Mike Torchia and Justin Grunewald. Rombough was the highest Minnesota finisher at the cross-country championships this fall, taking 20th.
Senior thrower leads women
The women’s track team also travels to Oregon this weekend, led by senior thrower Liz Podominick.
Podominick is coming off one of the better weeks of her career after winning titles in both the discus and shot put last weekend at the Texas Southern U Relays.
Also winning titles last weekend were thrower Ruby Radocaj, pole vaulter Andrea Smith, distance-runner Amy Laskowske and the relay team of Megan Duwell, Ladia Albertson-Junkans, Christina Engstrom and Ekene Obi.
