The University of Guelph Men’s and Women’s Cross Country teams will head down the 401 to London Saturday for the 34th Annual Western International. Annually this race, serves as an early season marking stick for the program, as it allows the Gryphons to compare themselves to the other top OUA and CIS schools.
Adding to the intrigue of this year’s event, will be the fact that many of the Gryphons will be making their seasonal debut. Headlining this group will be last year’s CIS MVP Lindsay Carson (Cambridge, Ontario). Carson will be leading the three time defending National Champions, into an incredible deep race which features eight returning All-Canadians, including Carson’s Gryphon teammates Rachel Cliff (Vancouver, British Columbia), Shantelle Novak (Regina, Saskatchewan) and Jess Vanhie (Alisa Craig, Ontario).
Carson, Cliff, Novak and teammate Courtney Laurie (Toronto, Ontario) will be joining a Gryphon team that put on a dominating display at last weekend’s New Balance Gryphon Open. Led by second year runners Laura McIvor (Vancouver, British Columbia) and Lindsay Furtado (Brampton, Ontario), the Gryphons had five of the top seven finishers and easily captured the team title.
The Gryphon men will be looking for redemption at this year’s Western International. Last year, the team finished 7th, their worst finish at the Western International during Head Coach Dave Scott-Thomas’ tenure. The race served as a wake up call, as the Gryphons were able to right the ship and on the same Thames Valley Course one month later, they captured their third consecutive OUA title and also went on to win their second consecutive CIS title two weeks later.
Like the Gryphon women, the men are coming off an impressive win at the New Balance Gryphon Open led by highly touted recruit Rob Jackson (Guelph, Ontario), Jackson debuted in the Red and Gold with an impressive fourth place finish. This weekend, Scott-Thomas will debut his other highly touted recruit Allan Brett of Ottawa. Brett, who transfered to Guelph last fall from Villanova, had to sit out last year due to CIS transfer rules. Saturday, he will finally have the opportunity to don the Gryphon singlet.
Making their seasonal debuts this weekend for the Gryphons will be returning first team All-Canadian Matt Brunsting (Stirling, Ontario), Team Captain Josh Roundell (Ottawa, Ontario) and fifth year man Derek Snider (Lindsay, Ontario). Not competing this weekend will be Kyle Boorsma (Guelph, Ontario), who had an extend summer racing schedule in Europe and Joe Brunsting (Stirling, Ontario), who battled injuries this summer which delayed the start of his preparations. Both will debut in two weeks time at the Paul Short Run at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania.
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