Titans cross-country rallies in opening race

Faster than same time last year

The training started three weeks ago for the Crested Butte Titans cross-country team but it wasn’t until the Delta Invite on Saturday, August 30 that the runners got an idea of how their training has been going.
Coach Austin Ross was really looking for two things out of his runners in Delta.
“We were hoping they would be faster than they were this time last year,” explains Ross. “And we wanted everyone to have a consistent race where their final mile split was close to their times in the first and second mile.”
In the end, a majority of the Titans hit those two goals with some exceeding expectations.
“Some of the kids really surprised themselves with how they improved,” says Ross.
Four Titan boys lined up for the varsity race with Aiden Truettner leading the way. Truettner ran a time of 16:43 on the five-kilometer course to finish ninth out of 148 runners. His time was three minutes faster than the time he ran in Delta last year and was seven seconds faster than his previous personal record.
Conad Truettner finished the day in 83rd place, Ben Swift in 97th and Joe Hayes fought through stomach issues to finish the race in 139th.
“Ben and Conrad ran really strong in their last mile which shows me they can go out stronger,” says Ross.
On the girl’s side of things, Sam Crossett and Tara Mortell represented the Titans in the varsity race. Crossett had a similar showing as Aiden posting a time of 21:58 to cross the finish line over two minutes faster than last year and set a new personal record time by 23 seconds. Mortell followed suit with a time of 22:34, almost four minutes faster than her time last year.
“That blew her race from last year out of the water,” says Ross.
Meanwhile, the JV girls posted impressive results among the larger programs placing sixth as a team.
“Most of the girls ran strong and it’s good to see they’re consistent,” says Ross. “My hope is that some of these girls will be able to make the jump to varsity by the end of the season.”
The team heads to Leadville this weekend for the Lake County Invite, a course that will test the Titans proficiency on hills.
“Leadville is hilly but not brutally steep,” says Ross. “Our goal is being consistent on hills, knowing where the line is and not blowing up.”