It was a record-breaking day for both the men’s and women’s cross-country teams this past Saturday in Auburn, Alabama, as 11 Falcons broke their personal collegiate records.

Mario Rothmund led the men’s squad for the fourth consecutive week, posting a personal-best time of 24:37.13, good for a 15th-place finish in a field of 253 finishers in the men’s 8K race. In doing so Rothmund met his season goal of finishing under the 25-minute mark. Head Coach Cami Wells was very pleased with Rothmund’s performance.

“Mario ran a fine race, he set a goal to get under 25 minutes this weekend and he went out and made it happen,” Wells said. Despite the accolades from his coach, the Falcon front-runner is not content to just settle for this personal record.

“I can still improve on this season’s record. I am at 90 percent right now, I feel that I can be back to 100 percent in time for the MAC Championships,” Rothmund said.

The men’s squad was very short-handed this weekend, with Phil King and Ed Stonestreet sidelined with injuries and Patrick Maynard having to miss the meet because of a musical performance. The absence of these three runners put pressure on the rest of the team to step up and fill their shoes. Josh Stucky was one of the Falcons who rose to the occasion, running a personal best time of 27:43.

“The challenge of being the number-five guy really pushed me,” Stucky said.

With only five runners competing in the race, the pressure was on each of these men to run their hardest as each of their times counted toward the overall team score. The men met this challenge head on as four of the five runners ran their best times of the season.

Kris Lachowski was the Falcons’ number two man, running the course in 26:17, his best time thus far this season, placing him 108th. He was followed by Troy Stiles, who took 132nd place with a time of 26:32. Steve Blasko (27:21, 172nd), and Josh Stucky (27:43, 191st), rounded out the Falcon finishers in the race.

Overall, the men placed 18th out of 30 schools participating in the race. The race was won Southern Methodist University, who was followed by Clemson, Georgia, Auburn, and Virginia Tech to round out the top five.

It was also a day of new records for the women’s team. Amber Culp, now the team’s front runner for four consecutive races, took nearly a minute off her previous best time of 18:35, finishing the race in 17:37. Culp placed 20th in a field of 235.

“Amber really gave everything she had out there and raced extremely well. She just gets more confident and aggressive every week. She is doing a great job of leading the team,” Wells said. Also breaking personal records on the women’s team were: Nicola Viljoen (18:17), Melissa Krueger (18:29), Sarah Lohrbach (18:37), Niki Suitor (18:44), Elise Gould, (18:49), and Leslie Carden (18:22).

The one negative on the women’s side is that Brianna Killian continues to be hampered by breathing problems, which really flared up during this weekend’s race. Killian will be seeing a specialist later this week in hopes of finally overcoming this problem.

“It has been a trial-and-error process,” Killian said. Despite the uncertainty of her condition at the MAC meet, Killian definitely plans on competing in the race.

The women placed 9th out of 30 teams in the 5K race. The top five schools were Virginia Tech, Auburn, Georgia Tech, Kentucky, and South Florida.

“I was pleased that we finished in the top 10, but I know that we can still make improvements in certain areas and perform better as a team,” Wells said.

The traditionally runner-friendly Auburn course definitely aided the runners in their record-setting efforts.

“It always felt like you were running downhill,” Stucky said.

This strong performance should give the men the confidence they need to meet the challenge that lies before them at the MAC championships.

“The men are facing some tough competition at the MAC meet, but they have been making improvements each week and are practicing very well,” Wells said.

The impressive showing by the women at Auburn has really boosted team leader Amber Culp’s confidence going into the MAC Championships.

“I think we have a good chance, anything can happen, we can definitely step up and walk away with a MAC Championship,” Culp said.

Culp and the rest of the women have two weeks to prepare themselves to make that happen.

The MAC Championships are scheduled to take place on Nov. 2 in Oxford, Ohio.