THE SCHEDULE                 Seattle Pacific at Bill Roe WWU Classic
                                                Saturday, Sept. 23, 2023
                                                Women's 6K, 10:00 a.m.     Men's 8K, 10:45 a.m.
                                                Lake Padden Park, Bellingham, Wash.
                                                No live Webcast        Live results
 
 
SEATTLE – The real championship meet in Anchorage is still a month away.
 
But the Seattle Pacific cross country teams figure to get a clearer picture of how they might stack up when they take a much shorter trip to Bellingham this weekend.
 
SPU and six of their Great Northwest Athletic Conference stablemates will be among the teams stepping to the starting line on Saturday in the Bill Roe Western Washington Classic at Lake Padden Park.
 
The women's 6-kilometer race begins at 10:00 a.m. The men's 8K follows at 10:45.
 
While it's common to see one or two other GNAC teams at other meets during the regular season, this one will attract all but three of the conference schools. Joining Seattle Pacific and host Western Washington will be Simon Fraser, Alaska Anchorage, Alaska Fairbanks, Central Washington and Saint Martin's.
 
All 10 schools will be in Anchorage's Kincaid Park on Saturday, Oct. 21 for the GNAC Championships.
 
A PERFECT AUTUMN MORNING FOR A RUN
The Falcons had a pair of rather warm Saturdays for their first two meets. This one won't be quite as warm, but still dry and pleasant. The forecast calls for mostly cloudy skies and temperatures at or slightly above 60 by race time. Rain isn't expected until sometime in the afternoon.

KEEPING TRACK OF THE ACTION
Live results, provided by Pacific Northwest Track & Field Officials, will be available from the meet. The appropriate link is at the top of this story.  No live Webcast will be available.
  
FINDING YOUR WAY TO THE ACTION
Head north on Interstate 5 to Exit 246 North Lake Samish. Turn left off the exit onto Samish Way, and continue for approximately 2.5 miles. Turn left on Lakshore Drive and follow that road into the park. There is a 'Y' in the road; keep to the right to go toward the parking lot for the park. (The left fork goes toward the golf course).
 
Parking is very limited within the park and likely will fill up quickly.



 

KEEPING AN EYE ON THE ACTION
While the course is a nice one from a runner's perspective with its varied terrain, very little asphalt, and a decent-sized hill on the back side of the lake.
 
But those who come to watch get to see just a very limited amount of the race. The women will leave the starting line, run out slightly less than one kilometer, turn around and come back toward the start, then turn around again behind the starting area and head out for one complete lap around the lake.
 
The men will run that opening loop twice, then head out for their lap around the lake. 
Both the men and women will run back into the park coming off their lake loop. The women will go a short distance, make a U-turn and head for the finish line. The men will do the first loop in reverse, making their U-turn continuing toward the finish.
 
Fans who stay near the starting line will be able to see the start and finish, as well as the early turnarounds for both races. The runners will be out of viewing range while going around the lake.

Click on this link for the women's 6K course map. Click on this link for the men's 8K map.

SCOUTING THE BILL ROE WWU CLASSIC
So far, the Falcons have seen Central Washington twice, Western Washington once, and Simon Fraser once. This will be their first look at both Alaska schools and Saint Martin's. The only other West Region school scheduled to make the trip is Hawaii Hilo.
 
Western's women dominated the season-opening Puget Sound Invitational with the first 14 runners across the finish line. At last week's PLU Invitational, Simon Fraser went 3-4-6-8-9, plus 11-12. Seattle Pacific was second in the opener, third last week, and was well ahead of Central in both meets.
 
 

Even though Simon Fraser was the dominant team at PLU, Annika Esvelt of the Falcons, who finished second, was 15 seconds ahead of the first Red Leafs runner. She did not race at the Puget Sound meet, so this will be her first chance to get in there and mix it up with the pack from WWU, which will be racing for the first time since that Sept. 2 opener.
 
The only runner ahead of Esvelt was Trinity Western's Constance Nankivel. The Spartans are entered on Saturday, so they might be on the same course once again.
 
While Esvelt was way out in front for SPU, sophomore Matise Mulch came up with a 16th place finish, with freshman Anna Prussian 23rd, sophomore Maya Ewing 24th, and all three of them within 20 seconds of each other for their first 6K of the season. (The UPS meet was 5K.
 
This will be just the second meet of the season for Anchorage and Fairbanks. They ran a 6K dual on Sept. 9 in Fairbanks, and the host Nanooks dominated, going 1-2-3-4  The junior par of Kendall Kramer and Naomi Bailey, who went 1-2 at last year's GNAC meet, also were 1-2 in the dual. Once again, they were essentially side-by-side at the finish line: 22:32 for Kramer, 22:33 for Kramer.
 
On the men's side, Seattle Pacific was fifth behind Western Washington at Puget Sound and fifth behind Simon Fraser at PLU. However, the Falcons did move ahead of Central Washington, going from seven points behind in the first meet (102-109) to two points ahead last week (160-162).
 
 

Brennan LeBlanc has been the leader of the SPU pack for both meets. He placed 11th at UPS and 15th at PLU. The Pacific Lutheran meet was his first 8K of the season, and LeBlanc finished in 25:47.5.
 
Sophomore Isaac Venable has had two solid races to start the year. He was 30th last week in 26:36.6, a time which was 73 seconds faster than his previous best 8K. Venable and freshman Silas Demmert worked together, and Demmert was just two seconds behind Venable at the finish line to place 31st.
 
ESVELT OUT FRONT FOR GNAC AWARD
Annika Esvelt's performance at the PLU Invitational earned her the GNAC Female Runner of the Week award this past Monday.
 
Esvelt's second-place finish at the PLU Invitational was easily the top run by any GNAC competitor on the third full weekend of meets.
 
It was the third time Esvelt has been named Runner of the Week for cross country.
 
 

COACH ERIC HANSEN SAYS …
(On going against six other GNAC schools)
"It will be good to see where we kind of stack up against the rest of the conference. We've seen a couple schools already and have gone back and forth with a couple of them the first two weeks.
 
(On some improvements he saw at the PLU meet)
"On the women's side, we definitely did a better job of staying engaged in the race that we did in Week 1. On the men's side, we did a better job of pack running, especially with our No. 2 and 3 (Isaac Venable and Silas Demmert) pushing each other the whole way. We're looking to keep playing to our strengths as far as those things go this week."
 
SITKA NATIVES MAKING THEIR MARK
They're still getting accustomed to the warmer weather. But based on their results so far, Silas Demmert and Anna Prussian are definitely warming up to college competition.
 
Both freshmen started their careers on Sept. 2 at the Puget Sound Invitational. Prussian led the SPU women's pack that day, finishing 17th overall. Demmert was the fifth and final Falcon scorer on the men's side placing 32nd.
 
 

Last Saturday at the PLU Invitational, Demmert moved all the way up to No. 3  for Seattle Pacific and was 31st overall in his first competitive 8-kilometer race. He was just two seconds behind No. 2 scoring teammate Isaac Vanable.
 
In the women's race, Prussian was No. 3 for SPU and 23^rd overall in her first 6K race.
 
Both bring some solid distance credentials to Seattle from The Last Frontier.
 
 

Prussian, after three consecutive runner-up finish in the Alaska Division II state meet, won it all last season. She also had a pair of firsts and a pair of seconds in the regional meet leading up to state.
 
Demmert won three straight regional championships, and had back-to-back top-10 finishes at state: seventh as a junior in 2021, and fifth last fall.


 
AROUND THE GNAC AND THE WEST
Last week was a light one for competition as just five of the GNAC's10 teams were in action.
 
Northwest Nazarene ran at the Cascade Collegiate Conference Preview in Caldwell, Idaho. The Nighthawks finished third in both meets, as College of Idaho and Southern Idah went 1-2 in both.
 
Montana State Billings ran at the Montana Invitational in Missoula The men were seventh among the eight teams, and the women wee ninth out of nine.
 
Elsewhere in the West Region, the Azusa Pacific men, in their season debut, were fourth among 22 teams at the UC Riverside Invite and beat six NCAA Division I schools. The Azusa women also beat six D1's and were seventh among the 20 teams.
 
In the California Collegiate Athletic association, Cal Poly Humboldt's men won a four-team meet that they hosted and Cal Poly Pomona was fifth out of 22 at UC Riverside. Humbodt's women were second in their own Invite.

Click on this link for the latest news, notes, and results from around the GNAC.
 
UP NEXT
The Falcons have next weekend off, then will run their fourth and final regular-season meet on Saturday, Oct. 7, at the Emerald City Open. Racing at Seattle's Lower Woodland Park starts at 10:30 a.m. with the men's 8K. The women's 6K starts at 11:15.