LOUISVILLE, Ky. ??With his eighth-place finish at the NCAA cross country championships, University of Wisconsin senior Mohammed Ahmed earned his fourth consecutive All-America honor, making him just the seventh Badger to do so.
UW coach Mick Byrne said Ahmed was battling some hip problems throughout the race at E.P. ?Tom? Sawyer State Park on Saturday. Ahmed said he was also fighting a side stitch throughout the race and admitted to being ?mentally messed up,? especially when he realized a shot at the individual title was no longer a possibility when eventual winner Kennedy Kithuku of Texas Tech bolted to a big lead.
Ahmed, who finished ninth a year ago, 12th in 2010 and 30th in 2009, had hoped to become just the fourth Badger to win an individual men?s crown and first since Simon Bairu won back-to-back championships in 2004-05.
He?ll have to settle for joining Matt Withrow (2005-08), Stuart Eagon (2005-08), Jason Casiano (1991-94), Tim Hacker (1982-85), Scott Jenkins (1982-85) and John Easker (1981-84) as the only four-time All-Americans in the history of the storied UW program.
?I don?t know what emotions I feel right now,? Ahmed said after the All-America and team awards ceremony. ?I?m kind of still confused. I don?t know if I feel super disappointed, or if I feel happy.?
Native sons
UW seniors Maverick Darling and Reed Connor were the first American-born athletes to cross the finish line, as each member of the top 10 was either foreign-born or an international citizen.
?That was my top goal this year, to be the first American, to really go after it,? Darling said. ?It definitely means something to me. I am very proud of my country, to represent it with pride.?
The top four runners ??Kithuka, who won two NAIA national titles at Wayland Baptist before transferring to Texas Tech; Arizona?s Stephen Sambu and Lawi Lalang, the defending champion; and UTEP?s Anthony Rotich ??are Kenyan. So are sixth-place Henry Lelei of Texas A&M and 10th-place Paul Chelimo of UNC-Greensboro.
Fifth-place finisher Girma Mecheso of Oklahoma State is Ethiopian, seventh-place David Rooney of McNeese State is Irish, and ninth-place Tom Farrell of Oklahoma State is from the United Kingdom. And Ahmed, who was born in Somalia, came to UW by way of St. Catharine?s, Ontario, where he moved when he was 11.
Darling is from Ovid, Mich., and Connor is from Houston.
?It means an awful lot,? Connor said. ?It was one of the things I was focused on going into the race. The top two Americans were Badgers today. That is special.?
Saturday?s not all right
The meet was held somewhere other than Seelyville, Ind., for the first time since 2003, but that wasn?t the most significant change undergone by the championships this year.
The NCAA decided to move the meet off of its traditional Monday, staging the competition on a Saturday for the first time since World War II. The decision was not popular with the Badgers.
?I do not like Saturday at all. I think competing with college football and NFL on Saturday-Sunday is a terrible idea for college distance running,? Darling said. ?I think putting it on Monday is a much better perspective. We?re able to have our own day. Trying to compete with those two things, we?re just not going to win.
?Hopefully they change it back.?
With the change in venue, it?s hard to tell if the move had any impact on the crowd at the meet, which was always well-attended in Indiana. Thousands roamed the state park on Saturday as temperatures climbed into the 60s on a cloudless day.
?I loved it. Tremendous crowd out here today. It?s great for the sport,? Byrne said. ?But we should have this meet at Thomas Zimmer Championship Course in Madison ??on a Monday.?
Flagged down
One notable difference in the crowd was the absence of a pack of rabid Badgers fans toting giant Motion W flags around the course during the race, something the UW contingent has become known for at big meets.
But according to the Badgers, it wasn?t the fans that were missing ??just the flags, which were inadvertently left in Madison by volunteer assistant coach Craig Miller, who finished his Badgers cross country career in 2009.
?We?ve been blaming him ever since we got here,? Darling said with a grin. ?We keep asking, ?Did you go back and get those flags?? He keeps smiling. I keep reiterating the fact that ?You left the flags at home. It?s all your fault.? I wish we would?ve brought them. They make so much of a difference.?
Ahmed and Connor both smiled when asked about Miller?s faux pas. Ahmed said the runners are too focused on the course to notice whether the big red flags are flying or not, but Connor begged to differ ??and promised to never let his good friend hear the end of it.
?I?m very disappointed in him, as a teammate and as an assistant coach now. We?ve got to have our flags, you know, some representation,? Connor said. ?We wouldn?t have been able to see them the whole course (because of the layout). But right there in the middle, that one spot where we can see everyone, we needed some flags, man.
?Miller, I?m calling you out ??you better not forget them next year.?
Familiar faces
Minnesota took 22nd in the women?s race, aided by two runners with local ties. Junior Maggie Bollig, a former Middleton athlete, was 128th, while freshman Liz Berkholtz of Sun Prairie was 214th.
* Iowa State junior Samantha Bluske, a former Pardeeville athlete, finished 108th to help the Cyclones to an 11th-place showing.
* Butler freshman Olivia Pratt, an ex-Madison West runner, took 195th as the Bulldogs finished 29th.
* Freshman Allie Woodward, a former Green Bay Notre Dame athlete, was Oregon?s fourth scoring runner in 44th overall.
* Notre Dame freshman Molly Seidel was 217th. The four-time WIAA state champion for Hartland University Lake School did not score for the Irish, who finished 15th.
Splits
Former Badger Emily Sisson finished 15th overall to earn All-America honors and help the Providence women to a runner-up finish. The junior was an All-American for UW in 2010 before transferring to the Friars. ? Providence was listed as the women?s champion when unofficial results were posted immediately after the race. Meet officials reviewed video footage from the finish line to obtain the correct results. ? With her runner-up finish, Oregon senior Jordan Hasay ??who burst onto the national scene as a 16-year-old when she qualified for the 1,500-meter final at the 2008 U.S. Olympic Trials ??scored her third straight top-three finish without ever having won a national title.
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