New Paltz, NY — Running in his first home meet of the season, State University of New York at New Paltz men's cross country senior Jake Meyers felt so comfortable that it reminded him of being back on Long Island.
 
In a difficult course at the Hudson Valley Sports Dome, Meyers, and the rest of the Hawks, competed in their first full race — men's 8K and women's 6K — of the season and Meyers highlighted the afternoon with a time of 27 minutes, 42 seconds to place first at his home-away-from-home course.
 
"It is such a nice way to start my senior year," he said after the race. "I know that my hard work has paid off. Clearly, I'm always excited to come to our famous sports dome. I love the rolling grass and just the atmosphere here. It kind of reminds me of Long Island, where I'm from. I ran at Bethpage State Park, so this is similar grounds to that, so good start to my season."
 
The men's race opened up the afternoon for SUNY New Paltz's first and only home meet of the season with Meyers getting ahead early and finishing nearly a minute faster of second-place finisher, which was his teammate Colin Battersby (28:39.9), while fellow Hawks senior Trey Hotaling wasn't too far behind as he crossed third seven seconds behind Battersby.
 
Vassar was projected to be the Hawks' top competition entering the meet, which also featured CUNY Brooklyn College, Pace University, SUNY Ulster and Mt. Saint Mary's College, but the Brewers didn't run their top harriers on the men's side and left Meyers out in front alone. Despite not having someone else to help set the pace, Meyers still finished more than a minute better than he did at the New Paltz Invite in 2019.
 
"Now that I'm a senior, I'm so much stronger than I was previously," Meyers said. "I'm definitely placing higher and I'm starting to rely on some top guys to push me in these races and Vassar is definitely a strong team, [and I] noticed they didn't have their top guys run. I don't know why, but it was definitely hard leading the race. Not really knowing the pace I was doing, I really didn't feel like I fully got an idea of where to push myself in certain spots to go in front of people, but I think I did a pretty good job a pacing overall." 
"He looks somebody who can make nationals and I just want to get him to regionals healthy and ready to take that opportunity then," added SUNY New Paltz coach Aislinn Ryan.
 
Following Meyers, Battersby and Hotaling was Brian Casey (29:50.9) who placed eighth, Carlos Vasquez (30:05.7) in 11th, Vincent Mandraccia (31:06.10), Chris D'Antonio (31:10), Luke Hoyt (31:16.20) and James Curley (31:21) finished 16th through 19th with Phil Akhmadi (33:54.9) crossing 26th.
 
On the women's side, Clara Flores-Reininger secured her first first-place finish of the season with a time of 24:50.7. She ran side-by-side with teammate Kate Cochran, who has been leading the way for the team the past two races as SUNY New Paltz's top runner. Flores-Reininger, who is familiar with the terrain, running it twice in 2019 and again over the preseason, felt like her comfortability with the course allowed her to push at the end and pass Cochran for first.
 
"Kind of knowing the course felt really good. We've been doing a lot of grass running, so I felt like the whole thing being on grass was something that we recognize and knew how to run on, so it was good," Flores-Reininger said. "The whole time we were pushing each other. When I was dying, she kind of pulled me along and I pulled her along and overall, I just felt kind of good. I didn't feel like I was dying for most of it, so toward the end I was like, why not? And just sprinted the last bit."
 
Cochran followed Flores-Reininger with a time of 24:59.7 with Marcella Candlin (27:18.8) and Ginny Clifford (28:12.2) crossing right after in third and fourth, respectively. Jazmyne Daily-Simpson wasn't too far, placing sixth with a time of 30:06.7, while Alison English finished eighth (30:25.9 and Ceren Cebeci 13th (32:54.6).
 
"I'm really proud of Clara for going past her friend. It's hard to do that, especially when it's someone who keeps leading workouts and races, and she's not afraid to take that opportunity and she did," Ryan said. "We have a lot of freshmen and so this was their first 6K and it's a very hard 6K. So, as far as that goes, I'm happy with how they handled the challenge. Of course, I always want more from people, but I think they did what they could do right now in their first race early September, we haven't even gotten into any of the super hard workouts yet. They're kind of running raw and they did pretty well for that."
 
Overall, the women scored 16 points after getting their top-5 runners in the top-10 overall. Pace totaled 53 points to finish second, followed by Mt. Saint Mary (73) and Brooklyn College (104). For the men, SUNY New Paltz totaled 25 points to edge Vassar (31). The Bulldogs and Setters followed with 92 and 98 points, respectively.  
 
"I was happy with the way the majority of the team went out controlled," Ryan added. "This is a really challenging course and if you go out too hard it's not going to go well, so they listened and that was a big win for me, because the better they do at that the better they did throughout the year."
 
The Hawks have more than a week off until their next meet when they head to Williamstown, MA Sept. 25 to compete in the Purple Valley Classic hosted by the Ephs. The women's race is scheduled for a noon start, while the men's is set for 12:45 p.m.

To view full results, click here.

Jake Meyers & Clara Flores-Reininger Post-Race Interview


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