The Golden Eagles took second place overall in the Ozarks Invitational on Saturday in Clarksville, Ark., on the University of the Ozarks’ campus.
Senior Tekste Gebreslasse and junior Marcos Gutierrez led the team. Coach Scott Schochler believed his team competed well at the meet.
“They passed people when they had the opportunity to do so, and they didn’t
let those runners pass them later in the race,” Schochler said.
Schochler, who is making his debut coaching performance for John Brown this season, has seen an improvement in the team.
“They are racing with more confidence now than they did early in the season,” he said.
Schochler has enjoyed watching this progress in each of the runners so far this season.
“All of the runners are trying to incorporate different race tactics we have talked about and worked on over the first several weeks of the season,” Schochler said. “To see them using those ideas and have success with them is very exciting.”
With its next meet more than a week away on Oct. 12, the team has some time to work on improving endurance, speed and work ethic.
“We will be continuing to run more miles each week,” Schochler said. “As the season goes along, the team will be running those at a faster pace in workouts.”
Schochler said that the women’s team is up to running 38 miles each week and that the men are running close to 70.
According to junior Tyler Awe, Schochler ran the marathon when he was in college, which Awe believes is benefitting the team as far as increasing their mileage.
Schochler attributes the runners’ success so far to their willingness to work hard towards their goals.
“They do anything they are asked to try,” he said. “Because of that, they are making steady progress toward being much faster this year at the conference meet in November.