Alumni Report Week 4

By: Caleb Gatchell

Week 4 saw a few big invites but a lot less PA Alums in action, so unfortunately there isn’t a whole lot to recap. However, the guys that did run were very impressive rolling with some of the best runners in the country.

Roy Griak

We’ll start off with Colin Abert who had a really solid performance. 25:52 for 41^st place might not sound like the most impressive of days, but when you look at the guys around him and the winning time, it stands out a bit more. Colin was only 45 seconds off of 1^st place, but what’s more impressive is the list of guys he beat including Steeplechase All-American Dylan Blankenbaker and Cross Country All-American Dylan Lafond. Behind Abert we saw Aaron Lauer finish 71^st, Ned Willig in 78^th, and Jake Brophy in 82^nd. While none of them had a particularly great race, they all had solid results considering the difficulty of the course and the muddy conditions. It will be interesting to see how Brophy in particular progresses this year as he starts to figure out the college races.

Panorama Farms Invite

This was undoubtedly the most impressive PA showing of the weekend as we saw 3 alums place top 40 in a very competitive field. Kevin James led the way with an 18^th place finish in 24:29, which is flying. He also played an important role for the defending national champions finishing as their 5^th man after Colin Bennie dropped out during the race. I was pretty high on James last week, and this week didn’t do anything to change that. I think he’s going to be a key part of the Orange title defense and he’s showing that he is up to the challenge. Not too far behind James was his teammate Griffin Molino. ‘Cuse has to be excited about his early progress as he is already under 25 minutes with his 24:56 performance. He’s still on the edge of being a top 7 runner, but whether he finishes the year as a varsity runner or not, this has to be considered a successful freshman campaign. Finally, Aaron Gebhart finished 35^th in 25:07. After redshirting last year this is his first really big cross country race, and he certainly didn’t disappoint. I’ve known this kid since he was a sophomore in high school and he’s always had a knack for stepping up at the biggest moments. That obviously hasn’t changed. I think he has the potential to have a really nice year and potentially be top 40 in his region by the time all’s said and done.

Lock Haven

Interestingly enough the most notable PA Alumni result here didn’t come from an attached runner. Eric Stratman, who has been running for the Pitt Club XC team, had a really solid day finishing 10^th in 26:03. I’m not sure why he’s not on the school team anymore, but he’s obviously training pretty well on his own and deserves a bit of recognition. Behind him we saw a couple of Lock Haven freshmen get some more experience in. Sam Signor finished 17^th in 26:28 which was another step forward for him. I still think he can break into Lock Haven’s top 7 by the end of the year. Not too far behind him another freshman Jacob Toczko also had a top 20 finish coming in at 26:30. While not outstanding, these are two solid results when you consider Signor and Toczko are freshmen. I think they’re figuring out the college race and should be set up well for success in the future.

As always, let me know what I missed!