Cross Country 2011 Season Outlook
8/26/2011 12:00:00 AM | Cross Country
Aug. 26, 2011
MALIBU, Calif. - Robert Radnoti is going to enjoy the 2011 cross country season for as long as he can, because when it's over, the sixth-year head coach will have to say farewell to a tremendous group of seniors that have pushed the program to new heights academically and spiritually.
There are six seniors on the women's roster and two more on the men's squad, and the leadership that these veterans have provided during early-season workouts and a training trip to Lake Tahoe has Radnoti beaming.
"It has been the best start to any season I've had here, and that was something I didn't really anticipate," he said. "What happened up at Lake Tahoe was really amazing. The last few years we've been integrating more spiritual aspects into our program, and we asked our kids to take on different roles. Last year I led all the devotionals, but we had four different student-athletes lead devotionals this year and they were so powerful. They tied in really well with everything we've been doing and talking about."
His runners have whole-heartedly embraced Pepperdine's mission of preparing students for purpose, service and leadership.
"That's something that's always been very important to me," Radnoti said. "I want to make sure our cross country program is aligned with Pepperdine's mission. I don't think I could be any prouder of what we've done to do just that."
And that comes back to his seniors, and most notably his team captains: Hannah DeWalt (Gig Harbor, Wash./Gig Harbor HS), Aneasha Lawrence (Sun Valley, Calif./Village Christian) and Lauren Lodge (Hopkinton, Mass./Hopkinton HS) on the women's side, and Kenny Smith (Willits, Calif./Willits HS) and Jordan Wozniak (Irvine, Calif./Woodbridge HS) on the men's team.
"The seniors have been with me for four years," Radnoti said. "There's such a special bond and I will hate to see them go. Everybody has improved so much since they've been here. That piece of it has been really exciting. The level of team development and ownership that the kids have developed over time is really amazing."
Lodge, who is coming back from injury, was an All-West Coast Conference first team selection last season after placing fifth overall at the league meet.
"She had a stress fracture at the end of track season and that put her back," Radnoti said. "To have the perfect buildup to the conference championship you need 24 weeks of aerobic capacity development. If you count back, that starts May 1. But Lauren didn't get started until mid-July because of the injury. So it's going to be tougher to overcome that, but she is such a tough competitor and so goal-oriented that I don't have any doubts that she's going to be even stronger than ever before by the end of the season."
As well as DeWalt and Lawrence, other women's runners expected to compete for spots in the regular lineup include sophomore Adrianna Davies (Coronado, Calif./Coronado HS) and seniors Paige Mobley (Murrieta, Calif./Murrieta Valley HS) and Courtney Rolando (Longmont, Colo./Silver Creek HS).
"These six runners make for a strong team," Radnoti said. "Unfortunately, five of them are seniors so we've got a lot of work to do to replace them next year."
Radnoti says that his men's captains, Smith and Wozniak, are poised for breakout seasons and could be among the top runners in the WCC. Smith didn't run last season after being injured but looks healthy this season. He's also high on juniors Sean King (Potomac, Md./Winston Churchill HS) and Jonathan Rahaeuser (Irvine, Calif./Calvary Chapel HS).
The cross country runners are always high academic achievers, as 22 student-athletes (those with grade-point averages above a 3.0) were named to the West Coast Conference Commissioner's Honor Roll, and 10 of them collected WCC All-Academic awards for cross country. Radnoti is proud of his team's off-the-course accomplishments and says with a smile that if the program's competitive level was able to match its spiritual and academic counterparts, Pepperdine would be national champions.
Though Radnoti admits that his Waves are a significant underdog in a very strong conference (the women were picked seventh in the WCC's preseason coaches' poll and the men were ninth) due to scholarship constraints, his vision of a successful season goes beyond the results of one race.
"Success is improving every meet," he said. "Success is to improve each year for each individual who's been here multiple years. Success is feeling good at the end of the season that we've given it all we've got. Success is peaking at the end of the season."
It's also helping his student-athletes for what comes next, as Radnoti enjoys talking about his former runners' lives after Pepperdine. One in particular, Liz Lyons, is a Fulbright scholar studying in South Korea who will attend law school at Wake Forest.
"I'll be writing a lot of letters of recommendation after the season," Radnoti said. "These seniors will graduate in May and then they'll be lining up jobs or graduate school. I get very excited to see what they accomplish. Those are the payoffs for a coach."
Pepperdine begins the season at home on September 1 with its annual Malibu Oceanside Open in Alumni Park (where the Waves will race against CSU Bakersfield). They have meets at UC Irvine, Stanford, Santa Clara and Cal State Fullerton before the WCC Championships (Oct. 29 at Crystal Springs in Belmont, Calif.).
