Yale Athletics

This weekend, Yale’s men’s and women’s cross country teams will compete in a total of three races.

The men’s squad kicks off the packed schedule on Friday in the Bronx at championships for Intercollegiate Association for Ameteur Athletes of America, or IC4A.

Much of the women’s squad will also head to New York City for the ECAC — short for Eastern College Athletic Conference — Championships. The team’s top seven runners will travel to Stillwater, Oklahoma on Saturday to compete at the Weis-Crockett Invitational, also known as Pre-Nationals. 

“On the women’s side we are a split squad,” women’s coach Taryn Sheehan wrote to the News. “Since we have such a young squad, we want to make sure we have enough opportunities for all our athletes to have preparation for the championship part of the season.”

Both locations give the teams important exposure to courses they will run later this season. The IC4A and the ECAC are held in Van Cortlandt Park, the site of both the Ivy Championships and NCAA Regionals. These will take place on Oct. 28 and Nov. 11, respectively. 

Pre-Nationals take place on the same course as the NCAA National Championship.

“This will be a really great opportunity for a portion of our team to get some experience racing on the same course that Heps and Regionals will be held on in a couple of weeks,” captain Samantha Friborg ’23 wrote to the News. “Knowing the course is a really crucial part of cross country. This meet will provide the group with great feedback about what portions of the race to attack more during the postseason.”

“Heps,” short for “heptagonals,” refers to the Ivy League Championships and the league’s original seven teams. Although the league’s composition has since expanded to include Cornell University, the name has stuck.

The field for each of the three races will be strong, with all eight Ivy League teams competing in the ECAC and IC4A. The Ancient Eight have competed against one another before during this season, but this will be the only time the whole conference will face off before the Ivy League championships at the end of this month.

For men’s captain Cade Brown ’23, racing against other Ivy League schools early in the season extends beyond getting exposure — the team is setting a precedent.

“Especially as distance runners who compete in the fall for Cross Country, winter for Indoor Track, and spring for outdoor track, we race against these other Ivy athletes very often, meaning success early in the year can have a beneficial snowball effect later down the line,” Brown wrote to the News.

This weekend marks the first of four championships the Cross Country teams will compete in during the home stretch of the season. 

Following next weekend’s CCSU Mini-Meet in New Britain, Connecticut, the Bulldogs will finish out the season with the Ivy League Championships and the NCAA Championships.