The Concordia Stingers cross-country team took to the Plains of Abraham in Quebec City last weekend for the third and final QSSF league meet of the season with another batch of solid performances. 

            The Rouge et Or meet, hosted by the Université Laval, was the last chance for Concordia runners to test themselves and try to secure a spot on the provincial roster for the QSSF provincial championships in Sherbrooke next weekend.

            The Stinger’s top performance came from women’s runner Johanna Winters, who placed 8^th overall and 4^th among the competing Quebec universities. She tackled the 4-kilometre course in 14:47 with a gap of 4 seconds between her and the next competitor from McGill.

            Despite having tired legs from the start, Winters jumped up one place in the Quebec standings after passing her rival from McGill who had previously nipped her out two weeks earlier at the Sherbrooke Vert et Or meet.

            “The race was decent,” said Winters, a visiting student from the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay. “I placed well, but the race didn’t feel good. I have yet to feel really fresh during a race.”

            Winters will get two more chances to race this season, once at the provincials next weekend and then two weeks later, back on the Plains of Abraham for the CIS National championships. With a few more weeks of consistent training and a proper peak before the races, she hopes to be feeling rested, strong and confident as her cross-country season comes to a close and she begins to prepare herself for the Nordic ski season back home in Wisconsin.

            Christina Lo Basso, the women’s captain, put in a solid performance, finishing 25^th overall and 7^th among Quebec university competitors with a time of 15:23, but was disappointed with her race.         

            “The race really didn’t go well for me at all,” said Lo Basso, a third year Exercise Science major, “I started way too fast and couldn’t keep a decent pace. I had no finishing kick at the end.”

            Lo Basso has a chance to not make the same mistake twice, as she will also race at the CIS Nationals on November 11^th. The course will be the same, and next time around, she plans to save some energy for the final hill up to the finish, a point she feels caters well to her running strengths.

            As for provincials, Lo Basso knows she is in a tough battle to achieve her season goal of being in the top-5. She is currently ranked 7^th, but hopes on race day she will be able to catch the two girls sitting in front of her from McGill.

            “Training has been going really well,” said the native Montrealer, “Hopefully on race day things will go as planned. The most important thing for me at this stage is to simply stay focused.”

The women’s team has been in a tight race with Sherbrooke and Laval for second place in the Quebec division, as the team from McGill continues to dominate. Lo Basso is confident the Concordia women will be able to pick off one of the teams and with strong performances from the others runners, maybe both.

            Also on the women’s side, notable performances came from Paola Calderon, who finished 23^rd in the Quebec university rankings with a time of 17:23, followed closely by Amélie Marcil-Roy, in 25^th with a time of 17:36, Nicole MacDonald in 26^th with a time of 19:20 and Émilie Cameron in 27^th with a time of 22:41.

            Calderon, who will also take on the QSSF provincial championships next weekend, was happy with her improvement since her last race two weeks ago.

            “My goal was to improve from my not-so-great performance at my first race in Sherbrooke back in September,” said Calderon, a first year Industrial Engineering student from Toronto. “I felt great before, during and after the race which was different to the experience that I had at Sherbrooke where my muscles were aching the days before and after the race.”

            The Concordia women placed 7^th in the team standings. First place went to St. Francis Xavier, followed by McGill, Dalhousie, Saint Mary’s, Sherbrooke and the University of New Brunswick. McGill and Sherbrooke were the only schools present from the Quebec university division.

            On the men’s side, the Stingers hit a new level of progression. All top-5 men who ran at the first QSSF meet in September improved their overall pace time from 3:43 per kilometre on the 6.1km course at McGill to 3:39 per kilometre on the 8-kilometre course in Quebec City.

            Concordia’s men’s captain Kyle Verboomen didn’t factor into these results as he did not finish the race, but the other Stinger’s men pulled through with solid performances.

            The top male finisher was Simon Malik-Giroux, who placed 20^th in the Quebec university standings with a time of 28:28. He was followed by Flavio Vasquez in 23^rd place with a time of 29:05, Chris Gates and Jonathan Dempsey who both hit the line at 29:22 for 24^th and 25^th respectively.

            Matt Tamblyn was 26^th in a time of 30:21, Kirill Kompaniets was 27^th in 31:01 and Dan Plouffe was 27^th in 31:19.

            The men’s team, which has consistently placed last in the Quebec university standings, still trains and races with a positive attitude.

            Our team really comes together in practice and feeds off each other,” said Dempsey, a 20-year old Political Science student. “Even though were last in the province, we have loads of positive energy coming out of us.”

“Every practice we work hard, and have fun too,” he added. “I think that’s important. We've grown a lot together.”

            Coach John Lofranco was pleased with the marked improvement on the men’s side and is confident they will reach their season goal of running an average time of under 37-minutes for the 10km provincial championship race.

         “The reason for this is simple: a hard working group that has put their

heads down and done the necessary work all fall,”  said Lofranco.

“Everything is going according to plan,” he added, in reference to the entire team.

The men’s team also placed 7^th overall in the team rankings. First place went to Sherbrooke, followed by St. Francis Xavier, Laval, McGill, University of New Brunswick and Saint Mary’s. Sherbrooke, Laval and McGill are the other Quebec universities.

            The Stingers will be in action on October 28^th, back in Sherbrooke for the QSSF provincial championships. Select runners will take on the CIS National championships two weeks later in Quebec City.

            For results, links and more information, visit the team’s website at http://alcor.concordia.ca/~runteam/ or keep updated on Sporting Canada.