Junior Becca Rae and Senior Greg Black finished in the top ten for the Falcons at the Mel Brodt Collegiate meet this past Friday.

Becca led the Falcons as their top racer in the 5,000 meter race, coming in eighth place with a time of 15:58.44. She was followed right behind by sophomore Mackenzie McMillin, who came in at 18:00.42. This was the second time in a row that Becca finished as the top runner for the team.

Junior Amanda Garlak and redshirt junior Andrea Alt, both racing for the first time this season, finished 13th and 14th place, respectively. Redshirt freshman Allison Francis finished 16th with a time of 18:29.18, setting a personal best in the process and beating her previous record by more than 15 seconds.

Head coach Lou Snelling was impressed with the team, saying they’re going in the right direction.

“Solid performance, good stuff from two weeks ago,” Snelling said. “All in all, I think we accomplished our goals”.

Snelling also commented on the performance of Rae and McMillin, particularly with Rae being in her first race of the season.

“Mackenzie had a really nice day, good stuff for her,” Snelling said. “She looked really good and finished really well”.

“Andrea in her first race of the season, it was solid,” Snelling said. “With where she’s at right now I’m happy with it, I know she’s not happy with it … but I think you’ll see it again in three weeks when we race again, she’ll take a really nice step”.

On the men’s side, Black finished first for the team, coming in fifth in the 8,000 meter race, with freshmen Nick Voth and Travis Jex coming just under the top ten with 11th and 12th place. Junior Jeremy Richard beat his time from the 2013 Mel Brodt Collegiate by more than 15 seconds, finishing in 24th with a time of 27:51.33.

Black was impressed with the team’s performance as well as his own and looks at the race as a building block for them to get better.

“Personally I thought it was a good opener for myself,” Black said. “As a team, as a whole we looked pretty good today. We have such a young team, a lot of freshman, a lot of first-year guys, but I thought they did really well out there…so I think this was really good start and we can build upon this”.

Assistant cross country coach Eric Thatcher felt the team did a good job with the young athletes staying in the race and being consistent throughout the meet.

“We did a really good job at being smart, making good decisions early and not getting blown out,” Thatcher said. “We felt like we did a good job of staying within a paced range that’s going to help us stay fairly consistent to the end of the meet”.

Snelling and the Falcons are looking forward to the All-Ohio championship meet in three weeks with excitement and the intent to show up with their A-game.

“We want to get to October fit and healthy,” Snelling said. “The volume is at the highest level and the intensity is really up there, we’re really going to be working hard these next three weeks”.

BG will be heading to Cedarville, Ohio, for the All-Ohio Championship meet on Oct. 3rd.