The Raiders are on a roll! As a team going into the meet, the Raiders have experienced quite a successful season thus far. At the Harry Long Invitational, hosted at Colgate University’s Harry H. Lang Cross Country Course on September 1, they earned second place with a total of 38 points. The team then competed at the UB Stampede in Buffalo NY, on September 14, where they earned 127 points, placing 6th for the meet.

The team looked to continue this successful season as they prepared for their third meet at Lehigh University. They attended the Paul Short Invitational, in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, on Saturday, September 29.

Junior Lucas Culley led the pack, pacing the Colgate Men’s Cross Country team. Culley ran a 26:52, with a 5:25 mile pace, ending in the 125th position. This was an impressive follow up to a stand out performance at the UB Stampede meet, in which he finished the 8000 meter course in 27:22.5, 44th best at the meet.

Juniors Luke Myers and Ryan Curran finished second and third respectively for Colgate. Myers crossed the finish line at 27:00, with Curran only steps behind him, finishing at 27:02.

Associate Head Coach of Cross Country and Track & Field, Luke Burdick is impressed by Curran.

“Ryan is in fantastic shape. He had a really good summer and put in a lot of good work… he’s obviously doing the right things that need to be done to com- pete at this level,” Burdick said.

Sophomore Brian Lafleche finished the race in 28:40 earning a 281st mark. Dillon Aryeh was the only first-year to compete in the invitational meet, and he ended with a time of 28:56 for the 287th place. Senior Jonathan Abbott, placed lowest for the Raiders, with a 29:32 time, claiming the 291st mark.

The runners, together, scored with 939 points, earning 39th place at the meet overall.

“The men had a few good performances, Williams ran a huge PR and helped to shore up our top-5 a bit. Culley was our top runner again today and seems to be still improving,” Burdick said of the teams performance.

The women’s team fared somewhat better than the men’s squad over the week- end, finishing out the meet in 33rd place.

Junior Vicky Martinez paced the entire Colgate squad individually, placing 91st out of the field of 362 runners with a total of 23:26 and a 1-mile split of 6:17. Senior Hannah Gunther was right on her teammate’s heels, finishing only one second behind with an identical 1-mile split. Some other high-performing women Raiders at this meet were senior Denise Larson and freshman Sophia Manners. Manners finished 195th overall, an impressive performance for a freshman in such an enormous field of talented female runners.