Jumbos Continue Early Season Roll at Purple Valley

(9/27/2015 7:59 PM) Full Results

A select group of Jumbos competed in the Purple Valley Classic this weekend. Resting our top 11 finishers from the Bates Shootout, we still placed 8th out of 22 teams and beat many full varsity squads including Coast Guard, Vassar, and DeSales who is currently ranked 8th in the Mideast Region. The meet, which was hosted by Williams College and held at the challenging Mt. Greylock course, proved to be the best effort of the season for those who competed.

The mid-distance squad started the day off with a bang by posting some impressive individual times in the 5k. Freshman Hiroto Watanabe was the team’s top finisher in the 5k with a time of 16:48.8 time for sixth place overall. Hiroto’s classmate Colin Raposo was not far behind, coming in at 17:00.7 for ninth place. Rookies Hiroto and Colin both ran faster over 5K than senior co-captains James Traester and Michael Curley did at the same course freshman year. Senior Alex Apostolides and sophomore Tom DePalma finished thirteenth and fourteenth overall with times of 17:18.1 and 17:21.9, respectively.

The Jumbos who competed in the 8k also ran fantastic times. Sophomore Ty Enos, in his season debut, led the charge for the Jumbos with a time of 27:17.3 for 60th place overall. Following behind Ty was first-year Andrew Doherty Munro in 27:18.3 for 62nd. Fellow freshman Tommy Doyle finished after Andrew and was the third man for the team with a time of 27:22.6.

Something important to note was that the four runners who competed at the Purple Valley Classic both this weekend and in 2014 (John Greenberg, Alex Apostolides, Ty Enos, and Chris Warren) improved by at least 45 seconds and averaged a 1:04 improvement from last year's performances. Sophomore John Greenberg ran 28:51 as a freshman and he ran 28:00 this past weekend. Junior Chris Warren ran 31:05 as a sophomore and he ran 29:31 this weekend.

Mt. Greylock is considered to be one of the harder courses in New England and unquestionably slower than the Pineland Farm course we raced last weekend. Every single freshman ran faster at Purple Valley than they did at Pineland Farm, a testament to how quickly they are figuring out the 8K distance and adapting well to college training.

Every Tufts runner who raced last year also improved on their placement this year. What makes that stat even more impressive is that the race was much more competitive this year with the addition #13 and #16 teams Pomona-Pitzer and Genesco traveling to race at the meet.

Next week, the Jumbos are off as they prepare to compete at the Open New England Championships held at Franklin Park on 10/10. The squad is eager to get some solid workout efforts under their belt in the meantime. #ROLL’BOS



Full Results