The University of Rhode Island women’s cross country team endured persistent rain and ankle-deep mud this weekend at the UMass Dartmouth Invitational.
Despite all of the outside factors, the team finished third out of 45 teams and all seven varsity runners placed in the top 50, out of 345 participants.
The top placer was fourth-year Sofia Piccone, finishing the 5000 meter race in 15th with a time of 18:09.54. Third-year Lily Saul followed in 24th with 18:18.15 and first-year Alison Pankowicz finished 32nd with a time of 18:32.14. URI also claimed the 36th, 39th, 40th and 48th positions. In the sub-varsity race, fourth-year Elise LePage came in 10th, fourth-year Sofia DeMuccio was 12th, and fourth-year Lindsay Turgeon came in 13th. Other URI runners came in 17th, 21st, 22nd and 23rd.
URI Head Coach Laurie Feit-Melnick testified to the strenuous conditions that her team overcame to get the results that they did.
“We’d never been there,” Feit-Melnick said. “It would have been nice to have run the course, and we didn’t even warm up on the course. It was just way too wet, so we just warmed up on the road.”
The team went into the race blind, having never ran it. They also had limited visibility due to the rain, according to Feit-Melnick. Not only did the team go blind into the race, but Saul had never run a 5000-meter race before.
“Lily Saul is a very good 800-meter runner,” Feit-Melnick said. “This is her first 5k as a junior on the track [or] on the cross country course.”
Piccone, who captained URI and was the team’s fastest finisher, said that the race had a lot of “stop and go,” more than normal due to the conditions. While the weather was less than ideal, Piccone still took positives out of the race.
“It was definitely a challenge, but it’s good to have challenging races, especially early in the season,” Piccone said.
As a fourth year student, Piccone is proud of her class being able to create a welcoming environment for the team.
“One of the biggest things we have worked on as a senior class is bringing a positive attitude to practice and I think just going out and enjoying running every day,” Piccone said.
Being a captain also plays a part in Piccone valuing a positive environment for the team. However, the role also comes with ups and downs.
“I do think there’s pressure that comes with it, but I also think that having been here for so long, it’s a good thing,” Piccone stated.
Feti-Melnick also saw the silver lining through the challenging conditions during the race.
“[It was] definitely positive because everyone finished, they dealt with the mud and the rain, and they just competed and it was a really nice, tight finish,” Feit-Melnick said.
URI was coming off a fourth place finish in their previous race at Providence College, and they topped their finish place from the race before that, coming in third overall at UMass Dartmouth. Their next race will be the New England Championships, on Saturday, Oct. 12th, in New Hampshire.