A storm delay and a race canceled halfway through made for an interesting opening meet for the North Carolina men’s and women’s cross country teams.
A race that was supposed to be treated as a workout turned hectic Friday at the Hokie Invite in Blacksburg, Virginia. The women’s team completed their 4-kilometer race, but the men’s 6-kilometer race was called off midway through because of lightning spotted near the course.
The Tar Heels had planned to use the race as a workout, making the first half of the race more conservative, while the runners attempted to hit negative splits each kilometer for the latter half.
Sophomore Josette Norris paced the women’s first place finish with one of her own, and sophomore Stella Radford and freshmen Morgan Ilse and Lucy Biles finished in the top-5.
But while the race went well for the women’s team, the men’s team ended up having to finish their workout in an interesting place — the hotel.
Quotable:
“I felt so bad because they were only three (kilometers) into their race, so they still had another half to go, but it got called off midway. So after we drove back to the hotel, they kept running around the hotel to get their mileage in.” — sophomore Josette Norris on the men’s cross country team.
Notable:
The Tar Heels wanted to focus on pack running during this race, said Norris, and they achieved that with six runners placing in the top-8 spots.
