Complete Meet Notes (PDF)

PORTLAND, Ore. — The hay is in the barn.
 
That's the phrase Portland State head cross country coach David Hepburn uses to essentially say, the training is done. It's time to race. The Vikings head to the Big Sky Championships this Saturday as fit as they're going to be this season.
 
"They've already done everything they need to do," Hepburn said. "They're not going to get any fitter this week. What they need to do is stay healthy and don't do anything dumb. Don't self-sabotage themselves."
 
If the Vikings can avoid those simple mistakes, then they could be racing for history at the Big Sky meet, hosted by the University of Northern Colorado at Boomerang Golf Course in Greeley, Colo. The Vikings recorded one of the best combined finishes between their men's and women's teams last season, when the women placed fifth overall and the men eighth. The fifth-place finish for the Viking women marked their best finish ever relative to the size of the conference.
 
If history comes this season, it will likely come on the men's side. The men are the deepest they've ever been going into the conference meet, a quality the team has shown multiple times throughout the season.
 
The Viking men placed their entire top five within 33.1 seconds of each while recording the team's best-ever finish at the Charles Bowles Invitational on Oct. 5. The Vikings placed second at that meet, and had the tightest spread of any team in the race – tighter even than the University of Portland, which won the race with 38.5 seconds separating its top five.
 
Additionally, a different runner has led the Viking men at every meet so far this season. Max Norman, Josh Snyder, Jason Rae and Drew Seidel have shared the lead, finishing as the Vikings' top runner in that order at the first four meets of the season. Those four have also consistently been in the team's top five throughout the season, along with freshman Brandon Hippe. They should challenge each other for top five finishes again at the Big Sky meet, along with Tom Richardson, a transfer from Boise State, who was the Vikings' second finisher at the Bronco Invitational on Oct. 19 in his first meet in a Viking singlet.
 
Hepburn says that depth has already paid off for the Vikings, regardless of what happens on Saturday.
 
"They payoff has already happened. Just purely because of the training groups that we've had, the guys pushing each other and really making each other better," Hepburn said. "That lets us put the best team forward going into conference. That's where that depth really pays off."
 
Still, those six runners could put the Vikings in line for history Saturday. The Viking men's highest finish ever in terms of placement came in 2002 and 2004, when the Vikings finished sixth at the Big Sky meet. That was back when the conference only had eight teams, however. The Vikings' highest finish ever relative to the size of the conference came in 2016, when they placed eighth in a 12-team Big Sky Conference.
 
A first-ever top-half finish could be possible this season considering the Vikings' depth. Luke Ramirez and Evan Peters will join the Vikings' other six runners at the meet, having consistently run in the team's top seven throughout the season.
 
"It was a really difficult decision [settling on a conference squad] because we had so many guys vying for those last couple of spots. Which is a good thing to have. It's been kind of fun to process through and see who we wanted to take, how we could put our best team out there," Hepburn said of the men's team.
 
Injuries have prevented the Viking women's team from having similar depth this season, though the women have still shown a solid top four that has performed well throughout the season.
 
The Viking women actually had a better showing than the men at the Bronco Invitational two weeks before the conference meet. They set five new personal bests in the 6k at the Bronco Invitational, including a near-school record for sophomore Hunter Storm. Storm led the Viking women with a finish in 20:51.4, 3.3 seconds off the school record Sarah Medved set at 20:48.1 at last season's NCAA West Regional.
 
Storm and the rest of the Viking women's top four also all placed in the top 10 at the Charles Bowles Invitational on Oct. 5. That tight bunching led the Viking women to only their second team win in 18 appearances at the meet.
 
Storm has led the Vikings at every meet his season, while Delaney White has placed second at all four meets so far. White has moved into the all-time top 10 for the 4k and 6k during the season, while Storm has moved into the top five at both distances.
 
The Phoebes have joined Storm and White in the women's top four, with Phoebe Jacques running third in the Vikings' lineup while Phoebe Brown has run fourth.
 
The question for the Viking women will be, who will finish fifth? Zoe Andersen and Saville Feist have each finished in the Vikings' top five this season, but both have been sidelined with injuries. Zoe Eberspecher and Monica Salazar have placed in the Vikings' top seven this season, and will compete for the Vikings Saturday.
 
The other two runners for the Viking women at the Big Sky meet will be freshmen in Sophie Jones and Keely Wolf. Jones placed sixth in the Vikings' lineup at the Cougar Classic on Sept. 13, but has been out with an injury since then. Wolf, meanwhile, had been redshirting this season but will run in a PSU singlet for the first time Saturday.
 
"The four ladies up front for us have been solid contributors all year long, which is absolutely fantastic," Hepburn said of the Viking women's team. "That means that the ladies that are behind them, it's just next-gal up. It's your time to shine, and just go out there and put forth a good race."
 
The Vikings need five finishers to close out their team score, of course, meaning one of the runners outside of the top four will need to step up. Hepburn remains confident that one of the four will do so, noting that the adrenaline stirred at a conference meet usually leads at least one runner to race well beyond their usual finish. What Hepburn hopes to avoid is one of the Vikings' top four runners out-doing herself in an effort to counteract any potential drop off and consequently burning herself out.
 
"They need to go out and do them," Hepburn said of the Viking women's top four. "They've been doing it right all year. You do you, and we'll let that fifth runner sort itself out behind them. They don't need to worry about it."
 
Throughout both teams, the Vikings will need to find a balance between channeling their adrenaline without going out too fast. Hepburn says that's been a focus all year in training, and he hopes the Vikings' young runners have learned that balance through racing at the team's regular-season meets.
 
"It's great to have the hype and ambition and adrenaline and desire to perform well. That will help. But hopefully we've learned our lesson and we'll go out, get through the first half, three-quarters of the race with some patience and then, 'okay, let loose.' And we'll see where the chips fall. That's where the ambition will come into play. And hopefully we've trained them to do that," Hepburn said.
 
The one new element for the Vikings will be the elevation. Greeley, Colo., where the conference meet will take place, sits at over 4,500 feet of elevation. The Vikings have not raced at any elevation above a few hundred feet yet this season, but Hepburn is quick to note that they have in the past.
 
"It'll be a test," Hepburn said of racing at elevation. "The good thing on the ladies' side is it is a 5k. Obviously some adrenaline will help with a little bit of that. A lot of this crew comes from elevation so they should be able to handle it okay. I think we've taken, maybe not this year, but we've taken people to elevation in the past, and they should be able to draw from that experience. If they haven't, then we at least have somebody on the team who they can ask about it."
 
Once again, the elevation will make balancing ambition with a smart race plan all the more important. Finishing times will also go out the window for a lot of the Vikings, though that's usually the last concern at a conference meet where placement trumps everything else.
 
"We talk about racing the race, which is different from racing the clock. You race the race. It's cross country. You do all the training and we get as physically fit as we can, then we race the race," Hepburn said.
 
And as Hepburn said, the hay is in the barn. The training is over. All that's left to do is to race the race.
 
MEET INFO
Nov. 2 – Big Sky Championships – Greeley, Colo. (Boomerang Golf Course)
 
MEET SCHEDULE
Race                Time
Women's 5k    11:30 a.m. (MT)
Men's 8k         12:30 p.m. (MT)
 
PORTLAND STATE ENTRIES
Women: Phoebe Brown, Zoe Eberspecher, Phoebe Jacques, Sophie Jones, Monica Salazar, Hunter Storm, Delaney White, Keely Wolf
Men: Brandon Hippe, Max Norman, Evan Peters, Jason Rae, Luke Ramirez, Tom Richardson, Drew Seidel, Josh Snyder
 
HISTORY AT BIG SKY CHAMPIONSHIPS
The Viking women recorded their best finish ever relative to the size of the Big Sky Conference while placing fifth out of 11 teams last season. It was only the second time the Vikings have ever placed in the top half of the conference, joining the Vikings' 2014 finish when the women placed sixth out of 12 teams. Kaila Gibson and Sarah Medved led the Viking women to the historic finish last season, as they became the first pair of teammates to finish in the top 10 together. The highest finish ever for a Viking women's runner at the Big Sky meet is seventh, which Sarah Dean and Melissa Telford accomplished in 2013 and 1999, respectively.
 
The Viking men had one of their best races last season, as well, finishing eighth out of 11 teams. The best finish ever for the Viking men, relative to the size of the conference, came in 2016, when they placed eighth out of 12 teams. The highest individual finish for a Viking men's runner is 14th, which Alex Cisneros and Michael Devenport achieved in 2016 and 2003, respectively.
 
LOOKING AHEAD
The Vikings' runners who will not compete at the Big Sky Championships Saturday will close out their season at the Beaver Classic on Nov. 9. The women will run a 6k at 11 a.m. (PT) while the men run an 8k at 12 p.m. (PT). Both races will take place at Crystal Lake Sports Fields in Corvallis, Ore.
 
The Vikings' conference runners, meanwhile, will next compete at the NCAA West Regional on Nov. 15. The women run a 6k at 11:30 a.m. (PT), while the men run a 10k at 12:30 p.m. (PT). Both races will be at the Colfax Golf Course in Colfax, Wash., where the Vikings competed at the Cougar Classic on Sept. 13.