A string of old injuries and recent sickness will prevent the UF men and women’s cross country teams from being full-strength this Saturday as they take on a loaded field of 14 ranked teams at the Wisconsin Adidas Invitational.
The No. 7 women’s team will be without All-American Rebecca Lowe for the second meet in a row as she continues to sit out with an injury from an NCAA indoor meet earlier this year. Freshman Shelby Hayes is also questionable to compete due to injury, UF cross country coach Todd Morgan said.
“It’s a big meet coming up,” he said. “But in the scheme of the season it’s early, and I’ve got to make sure we make the right decisions for the SEC and NCAA championship.”
Several runners on the men’s team including freshman Matt Mizereck, who finished ninth two weeks ago at the Mountain Dew Invitational, became ill this week and are day-to-day on whether they can attend the meet.
“If they can’t run, it’s because I couldn’t put them on a plane with a fever,” Morgan said.
The cautious approach on personnel heading into the weekend, however, will open up the opportunity for two freshman runners to continue being overall point contributors.
Last week’s SEC Freshman of the Week Mark Parrish and women’s freshman Cory McGee, who finished fourth and sixth respectively at the Mountain Dew Invitational, both crossed the line fast enough to score for the Gators during their last race.
Morgan said the two were running well enough that they would be contributing regardless of whom else was competing for the Gators.
“They’ve been looking good,” he said. “It’s not that they have to; it’s just that they’re rolling.”
Both runners attributed their initial success this season to the higher level of training they have gotten in the college ranks. McGee said that the intensity and competition of practicing in a team atmosphere is nothing like what she experienced at her high school in Mississippi, where most of her training was done individually.
“I didn’t really run with a team for the past few years,” she said. “So that’s definitely a change. It’s actually really nice to have someone else to train with.”
Parrish pointed out that even though training and practices have been demanding, they will still have to adjust themselves to the higher pace of the competition in Wisconsin. He predicts that the team will not be able to stay in a pack for very long, making it his job to keep in touch with the front of the race.
“I definitely want to be up there in the top on the team and just try to go faster,” Parrish said. “That’s what you try to do every week.”
While the men’s team will race its usual distance of 8K at noon, the women’s team will race its first 6K of the season at 12:45 p.m. At the MDI two weeks ago the team ran a 5K. In high school, McGee said she ran mostly 4K races and only occasionally delved into the longer challenges.
“They’re fine,” Morgan said. “We’ve prepared for that. The meets that matter are 6K, and honestly, physiologically the difference is pretty small.”
