Facing off against all seven of its Ivy League foes, Dartmouth's men's and women's cross country teams posted third and sixth place finishes, respectively, at the 2009 Heptagonal Cross Country Championships at Van Cortlandt Park in New York on Friday.
On the men's side, the Big Green finished with 90 points, placing third behind Columbia and Princeton, who netted 60 and 61 points, respectively. Each team's score is the sum of the top five individual finishes on the team.
"It was an okay performance," head coach Barry Harwick said. "I fully expected the team to challenge for the title, but Columbia and Princeton ran very good races."
Tom Robbins '11 was the top runner for the Big Green with a final time of 25:42, good for ninth place overall.
"I gave it my best effort," Robbins said. "I may be capable of running a better time, but on that day, that was the best I could have run."
Other Dartmouth notable finishers include Ethan Shaw '12, who finished second on the team with a final time of 25:55. Shaw's time gained him 16th place overall, a dramatic improvement from his 65th-place finish at the same event just one year ago.
Chris Zablocki '10, Kevin Treadway '10 and Alex Hall '10 rounded out the Dartmouth top five, finishing 17th, 22nd and 26th, respectively.
Columbia edged out cross country powerhouse Princeton by one point to take home the 2009 Heps championship crown.
"Columbia ran a very smart race," Robbins said. "They had the advantage of running on their home course, and they ran their best race of the season."
The Big Green considers Heps to be one of the most important and interesting races on its schedule, Robbins said, noting that the event is rich in tradition.
"We take Heps very seriously," Harwick said. "The Ivy League is very strong in cross country, so we have a lot of rivalries within our league."
The Dartmouth women's cross country team finished sixth at the event, with a team score of 167. Princeton swept all of the top five spots, posting a perfect score of 15 and claiming this year's title.
"Princeton is untouchable right now," Dartmouth women's head coach Maribel Souther said. "Historically, they have been able to attract nationally-ranked runners in high school. Their roster is filled with national champions."
Souther said she was encouraged by the Big Green's sixth-place finish.
"As a team, we did really well," she said. "We ran as well as we could have and we showed great improvement from last year."
The top five Dartmouth runners were Amy Schuman '12, Elizabeth Short '12, Kaitlyn D'Orazio '13, Kate Sullivan '13 and Monica Hernandez '10 all of whom ran lifetime or course personal records on Friday.
"Personally, I was very happy with the race," Schuman, who notched her own personal course record, said. "As a team, we all put forth a great effort."
The Big Green showed great consistency at Heps: The team's spread the time difference between the first runner and the last runner on the team was only 19 seconds.
Despite Princeton's commanding weekend performance, Schuman said the team has its eyes set on other Ivy League rivals.
"Our next goal is to beat Brown, possibly at Regionals," Schuman said. "The rest of the league is also not out of our reach."
The NCAA Regional meet, the final race for the Dartmouth women's team, will take place at Franklin Park in Boston on Nov. 14.
The team is looking for a top-10 finish at the meet to close out the season on a strong note, Souther said.
The Big Green men's team, meanwhile, will now look to its own NCAA Regional meet. The results of that race will determine NCAA Nationals eligibility both for individual runners and for teams.
Several Big Green runners, including Robbins and Shaw, are looking to qualify for the NCAA National Championship, which will be held at Indiana State University on Nov. 23.
As a team, the Big Green men still have an outside chance of making Nationals, Robbins said.
