The Wildcat cross country team is lacing up to run at the Woody Greeno/Jay Dirkson Invitational at the Mahoney Golf Course on Sept. 20. This meet is co-hosted by the University of Nebraska Lincoln and Nebraska Wesleyan University and has schools of all different sizes competing together. 

“It’s a pretty good mix of division one, division two, division three,” head coach Marlon Brink said. 

A meet of this size will prepare runners for larger meets, like the NSIC championships and regional meets. 

“It is a pretty large meet, and it’s pretty good competition,” Brink said. “Hopefully this prepares us for the NSIC championships, which are about a month away.” 

Preparation for this meet has been long and tough for Wildcat runners. Junior Brady Franzen described the team’s recent workouts. 

“We’ve been putting a lot more emphasis on running on grass and the golf course this year, so that should prepare us better,” Franzen said. 

This meet’s course is more difficult than other courses that the team runs. The Mahoney Golf Course presents many hills and difficult turns, according to runner Allie Czapla. 

“This is a super big, very technical course,” Czapla said. “A lot of hills, a lot of goofy turns.”  

Franzen also spoke about the hills of this course being difficult especially when coming up on the finish line. 

“I think about the finish because it’s a long, kind of gradual hill,” Franzen said. “So you have to grind when you go to finish.” 

Not only is cross country a physically demanding sport, it can also be mentally tough. 

Brink said that not every mile is going to be as easy as the first. 

“There’s just going to be some miles that just kind of suck,” Brink said. “And they just got to push through those, and if they can tell themselves that they can do it, that’s half the battle sometimes.” 

After this meet, the team will host the Wildcat Classic on Sept. 26.