The Quakers’ split-squad program delivered split results.
On Friday morning, both teams found themselves around 650 miles apart as some athletes traveled to South Bend, Ind. for the Piane Notre Dame Invitational, and others returned to Bethlehem, Pa. for the Paul Short Invitational at Lehigh.
Friday’s performance at Paul Short included shining performances from the Red and Blue’s freshman runners. Three of the five Penn athletes to crack the top 50 in their respective events were freshmen, and the remaining three freshmen finished in the top 100.
The men’s team, led by sophomore Justin Iler, impressed in their return to Lehigh. Finishing just seven points shy of Concord, the Quakers placed fifth out of 41 total teams in the men’s College Brown 8k. Iler crossed the finish line first for Penn, coming in sixth overall with a final time of 24:55.4.
Freshmen Dylan Throop and Vidhur Polam came in 17th and 40th overall, respectively, while the remaining top five scorers for the men’s team were rounded out by freshmen Jonah Gorevic (60th) and Edwin Klanke (98th). They concluded the race with a score of 218 and an average time of 25:37.
As for the women, their day concluded with no team score, but they were still able to put up a strong performance. Finishing 27th overall and first for Penn, sophomore Zoe Shetty’s 6k time improved to 21:59.0, compared to 23:27.4 the last time the women ran 6k in Lehigh on Sept. 3.
Like Iler, Shetty was trailed by her freshman teammates Chloe Hassman (38th) and Miranda Schriver (69th), and by sophomore Maggie Maier (113th).
Continuing the sophomore-leader pattern was Olivia Morganti, who finished first for Penn in the women’s College Blue 5k at Piane. She crossed in 90th place and clocked a total time of 17:23.5. Morganti was closely followed by senior captain Ariana Gardizy (110th) whose final time was 17:32.6. Rounding out the top five were sophomore Fabianna Szorenyi, junior Lizzy Bader, and senior Niamh Hayes, who finished within 23 seconds of each other.
In the end, despite three Quakers finishing under the 18-minute mark, the women’s team concluded the race in 25th out of 25 total teams and with a point total of 658.
On the men’s side, red-hot senior captain Noah Carey led the Quaker pack at Piane in the men’s five mile race taking 19th place and clocking a time of 23:58.0. As a team, the Red and Blue finished 17th out of 23 total teams with 394 points. Similar to their teammates at Paul Short, the five best-scoring Quakers for this event cracked the top 150.
Both the men’s and women’s team will look to improve upon their Friday performance during their next event in two weeks. The men’s team will suit up in Charlottesville, Va. at the Virginia/Panorama Invitational, while the women’s team will be in State College, Pa. at the Penn State National Open.
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