Team heading into Conference (Kensey Berry)
The men’s and women’s cross country teams head to California this weekend to compete in the West Coast Conference Championships.
The women’s team has a tradition of signing personal commitment contracts leading up to conference weekend, made by the team captains. Captains Kelsey Brown and Andrea Nelson Harrison realize that in order to fully reach their potential as a team, they individually need to achieve the goals and tactics listed on the contract.
One highlighted goal on the contract is trust. 'Trust your coach, your teammates and The Lord,” the contract reads.
'Trust has to be a team effort and everyone has to play their part,' Brown said. 'We each know our individual roles that we have to do and where we need to be throughout the race to make that happen, we now just need to make it happen.”
The women’s team is ranked high enough within the conference to have a good chance to come away with a team title.
“If the team ultimately does best can win the conference championship,” Jennica Redd said.
The men’s cross country team also has team traditions, and sets many goals before the conference meet. A tradition that has stuck for the past couple years is beating out the competition that Portland brings to the conference meet.
Over the past few seasons, Portland and BYU have battled for the conference title. Portland is ranked higher than BYU coming into this year’s meet, but the team understands what needs to happen to achieve the championship.
'We realize that the team is going in as an underdog,' said Travis Fuller, a member of the men's cross country team. 'So it is time to rise up and have fun while showing people the real BYU.”
The men’s cross country team has set a goal of running fearless, going in to the meet knowing that it can match up with any competition and out-kick them the last 3K.
“We've worked hard to run fearless, and to be confident as a team and individually,' Fuller said. 'So when we see the purple shirts of Portland, we make sure we are matching up and covering every move.”
Both the women’s and men’s teams will leave Friday to compete on Nov 1. The women's race will take place in Sunnyvale, California and the men’s will take place in Santa Clara, California.