Men's Mid-Season Musings: 2012

1.     Guelph – Once again, they stand head-and-shoulders above the throng of the CIS. But their mightier-than-thou mindset may be their undoing in the only race that will actually a challenge for them: the race with past year’s teams. Does the current team match up against the one from 2010, where they almost scored a perfect 15 at OUAs, and the one from 2011, where every scorer was first team AC? Mid-distance dynamo and lactose-intolerant Tommy Lecours seems to be doing well keeping up with the big 3 (Nixon, Proudfoot, and Hendrikx) so if Sikubwabo can pull it together, these guys have a legitimate opportunity to do so.

2.  Victoria – Historically, these guys have done well at the dance racing as little as possible (makes us wonder why more Ontario teams don’t try it) and this year should be no different. Callipygian superman Dylan Haight and fictional-character-come-to-life Ryan Cassidy lead their squad of fellow Norsemen (Oxland, Clouthier, Therrien and spellcheck’s worst nightmare Pstotka) that should, on paper, do well at the party. Hulse’s guilt complex seems to be keeping him from competition as he or his cheek bones have yet to be seen this year.  Also, we’ve heard rumours Olivier Collin is floating around the City of Newly Weds and Nearly Deads, scoring dates with sun-kissed surfer chicks and helping little old ladies across the street, so it’s no wonder he appears not to be competing this year.

3.  Queen’s – Between Archer, Patterson, McGraw, Cashin, Loney, and Costen, they should be able to put 5 into the top 30, which has historically been good enough for a medal. Of note, All-Canadian and Oreo cookie connoisseur Jeff Archer hopes to build off a breakout season he had during last year’s championship races. Whether or not they have a treasure trove of the running equivalent to Oompa-Loompas, that would virtually guarantee them a medal, remains to be seen. If this were any other team, we might drop them to 4^th or 5^th. Being Queen’s, we’re comfortable leaving them in the medals, at least for now.

4. Windsor – Despite having lost 3 of their 5 scorers, this team continues to roll. First-team AC and facial hair purveyor Matt Walters is riding the momentum of a strong track campaign, yet the health of Janikowski (sat out last week due to injury) remains in question. The rookies Master and Cooper are not as garbage as we initially thought them to be and vets Kegel, Meloche, and Falk seem to be able to deal with the added weight on their shoulders, despite the strong possibility of lack of weight training.

5. McMaster – Seem to be falling out of favour in the race for 2^nd, despite not having fledged a full team yet. Being chalk full of triathletes, we feel we have to give credit where credit is due. Sanders, Darlington, and Walsh have had strong showings already this year, and guys like Reid, Bowes, and Bierema are looming off in the distance, ready to pounce all over the rest of the CIS. The winner of this year’s race for second will be decided more by quantity than quality, and these guys have more talent than the Walking Dead had zombies in last season’s finale. Don’t let us down…

6. Laval – If these guys had as many good CIS races as they had number of names, they would be medal favourites for sure. Unfortunately, the team of JS Lapointe, Chuck PT, Boisvert, Labranche, and JSFD are in tough again this year. Losing head-to-head against Windsor at Western with almost a full squad doesn’t bode well for these guys. Neither does moving up 20 points in the second half of that race; we blame the cultural barrier and believe their pacing may be off due to the difference between the Quebec meaning and the Ontario meaning of what constitutes a kilometre. A strong possibility remains these guys run out of gas come November due to recent years’ flops at national championships this year’s strength of the RSSQ as a whole (most of them probably consider the RSSQ to be the national championship anyways). Still, if their maple syrup rations hold, they might yet surprise us.

7. Regina – Apparently we neglected to mention this team had Wyatt Baiton in the last issue. Sorry Wyatt, but we don’t apologize for the mistakes we make here at P&P. Furthermore, it’s more of a blessing to go unmentioned on these things. Did you not just read the smack-down we gave Laval? Anyways, 4 deep is good enough secure this spot, and if game-changers Fyfe and Johnson run well they could even scrape into the top 5. No pressure boys.

8. Toronto – No standouts, but a solid team through and through. Plus, they’re probably the nicest group of guys you’d ever meet. I’d be totally cool with any one of them dating my sister, if I had one. So yeah, 8^th.

First Team AC: Wiebe, Nixon, Proudfoot, Walters, Hendrikx, Haight, Sanders

Second Team AC: Lecours, Sikubwabo, Archer, Loney, Janikowski, Darlington, Cassidy

2012 Pre-Season Slams: Women

No introduction could possibly prepare for these preds.

1. Guelph
In many ways the CIS XC season on the women's side reminds the P&P staff of Saturday morning cartoons - the plot lines will get stretched out over two months and everyone will get up to lots of hijinks, but at the end of the day nobody really expects Phineas & Ferb not to come out on top. The lady Gryphs have graduated Furtado and Brown, but we still expect the 2012 edition to play out much like years past. The Guelphites pick up blue-chip recruits like other schools pick up polypropylene longsleeves - cases in point Maddy Yungblut and Katrina Allison have reportedly ventured into sub-10:00 Andre 3000 territory. 

2. Victoria
Much like the men's rankings, if anyone will play Squidward to Guelph's Spongebob, it will be the ladies from Le Ouest. Newcomers to the Bikini Bottom scene include Calgary transfer Maddy MacDonald (6th at CIS 2010) and Jenna van Vliete (30th at CIS 2010). Rookie Emma Bibault should be a regular contributor to Victoria Performs Well as a Team magazine and our intelligence informs us that Riley McQueen ovalled the oval pretty quickly once or twice this summer. Holes in the Vikes' Swiss include Laura Mitic and Alicia Roske, 3rd and 6th on last year's depth chart. Frankly, we're not sure if they'll have the tools to seriously challenge for the title, but nobody thought dogs could play basketball before Air Bud either. We'll root for these underdogs. 

3. McMaster
The Mac girls will be a changed team this year. With Anderson, Haliburton, and Giovannetti packing up their copies of Dr. Seuss' "Oh the Places You'll Go", at first glance they look like an indie rock collective with no harpsichord player. But with former CIS champ Lindsay Carson healthy and running well, first and second AC ladies Victoria “Mud in your eye” Coates, and Jill Wyman, the Mac girls will be just fine. OFSAA and Jr. National 3000m champion Madeline McDonald will be snooping around in search of ROY honours. Fighting for the top seven spots on this talented team will be distance star and team captain Stephanie MacNeill, Zooey Deschanel wannabe Courtney Patterson, Chelsea Mackinnon, and rookie Tiffany Cheung. They'll be in the hunt for any flavour of medal.

4. Western
Boasting home court advantage (No, literally. They probably will be boasting about it.) and returning MOST of their top 7 from last year, except for last year's top scorer Jen Bays. Duke transfer Amanda Truelove and Becky (nom nom mileage) Pieterson will have to step up their game in order for the girl-stangs to challenge for both a podium spot or an afterparty title. But like their male counterparts, they'll have to perfect the perfect lemon-meringue-pie double peak. Regardless, safe money says there'll be some High Violet at the Nationals. 

5. McGill
If you're a social media-savvy sports fan in Montreal, the local hockey club asks you to "#raisethetorch" to scare up hype for the bleu blanc et rouge (French words: are we doing them right?). At P&P XC is the name of the game and we encourage #washyourshorts instead. The Martlets will likely be washing off a mixture of blood, sweat, tears, curd and gravy as they hunt for an RSEQ title and a top-5 national (international?) finish. They lose their top finisher Charlene Puel, and 6th gal Catherine Drouin-Audet, but return everyone else like a stack of untouched ANTH 101 textbooks, and with Caroline "Pfister the Shifter" Pfister in the mix, this team looks another year plus forte. If Western or Mac falters, the 'Lets will be picking up the pieces faster than the average Dyson product. 

6. Saskatchewan
Ever since we watched Balto we've had a soft spot for the Huskies, and with their big three gone (Souter, Warkentin, Richards) this team will need an equally heroic story to avoid tumbling down the standings. Leia Fedyk and Rachael Edwards are the Husk-varna engines that will be driving these girls along the Iditarod Trail, and they'll need some young pups to set down their chew toys and take on some real responsibility. Last year they were narrowly nipped for the bronze medal spot, but we don't see them Phelps-ing again this year. In fact, they only reason we've got them pegged as high as 6th is because we wrote these in order and couldn't wait to make some dog jokes. Remember Clifford? That guy was way bigger than a regular dog.

7. StFx 
The AUS conference (bonspiel? informal gathering of like-minded lobster farmers?) is easy to forget, but at P&P we make it our business to fish up obscure teams and make unfounded claims about how they'll perform. St. FX seems to be the class of the East Coast, but come CIS will probably still be further under the radar than a rough draft of a review for an independent screenplay set to open in 2016. It looks like top gun Kelly MacDonald has flown the coop, as have #3 Rebecca Reeves and #6 Tory Anderson. We've slotted them in 7th so as not to hurt their feelings, but without big years from rookies Sadie "Maverick" Petrie and Kendra "Goose" MacNeil this team won't beat Laval. Kannenberg and Hardy will be the other trees holding up the St. FX tree fort. We don't like to restrict our predictions to race results, so here's another one: it seems like only a matter of time before they'll develop an Eiffel 65-based cheer.

8. Laval
It's common knowledge (seriously, there's a Wikipedia article about it) that the Laval men's team is more star-studded than Albus Dumbledore's pillowcase. But what about the women? Frankly, we don't have a clue. A track-centric team should be able to shake and bake on a 5k XC course. The good folks at montrealendurance.com are our go-to source for in-depth analysis of all things francophone, and they've pegged Laval as the #2 fiddler on the RSEQ roof, with Cote, Brochu and Plante-Dube being the major players. But at P&P we don't believe knowing anything about anything is a prerequisite for making the right call, so we're confidently claiming they'll grab #8 with less difficulty than Mark Recchi. 

9. Calgary
After exhaustively reading reviews of Calgary restaurants on Yelp! and looking at pictures of dinosaurs, we've deduced that Calgary should be in good shape to pull off the unprecedented "Gretzky" - a second straight 9th place finish. Sure, you may say, they've graduated Stenning, whose 24th-place finish earned her first-team All-the-Canadians-in-the-Box honours, and Altomare (56th last year) but the Dinos should return Grace "Kary the Team On My Back" Kary (15th in 2011). The team will need their supporting cast (Pike? L'Heureux?) to fill in the gaps if they're going to Connect Five. 

10. Queens
With rumours of cheerleaders on the team, we think that Boyd may have gone off the deep end this year, but at the same time, it’s so crazy it just might work. They lose their number 2, Kallos, and 5, 6, 7 (Prufer, Wilson, Roth). Stephanie Hulse is sure to put up some big races, alongside teammate Veronica Allan, not to mention rookie and OFSAA steeple champ Julie-Anne Staelhi. They’ve even got former Marauder Sara Giovanetti in the mix, which makes this look like a team that has the potential to move their way up the rankings. Not one to withhold trenchant analysis, the head coach had this to say: "The girls' team? Yeah, they're pretty fast too. It's actually disconcerting. I won't expect them back from a workout for another few minutes, and then they'll show up and I'll just be sitting in the car eating a slice of pumpernickel bread."

Edition 2012: The Pre-Season Installment (Men's)

Too few times during the year does anticipation rise as high as it does at the dawn of the Canadian Interuniversity cross country season. It’s much in a sense a runners’ Christmas, or non-denominational winter holiday for our non-Christian and avid-Seinfeld-watching readers. Except instead of charmingly cute kids charging down the stairs to find what was left under the Christmas tree / Hanukkah menorah / Festivus pole, XC most prominently features a bunch of underdressed, underdeveloped man-children running around a bit before puking their guts all over the place. It's just one of those exceptionally unique things.

The 2012 edition of Men’s Putdowns & Prognostications holds true to the title – we put down, and we prognosticate. We don’t say we know everything (not in public anyway), but you can be damn sure we’re going to pretend like we do. After all, science proved that last year’s P&P was not only the most accurate of all CIS pollsters (citation not needed), but it was also 60% more entertaining. And you can't refute the science.

And now, without further ado, I bring you the first of several installments for this year’s edition:

1. Guelph – The leader of the pack, bar none. Rumour has it the only reason Guelph didn’t sweep top 7 last year is coach Scott-Thomas, wanting to see how much he could get away with, made the team guzzle two liters of milk brought straight in from the family farm. Unfortunately for him, Lecours and Hinton are strictly lactose-intolerant. “I knew I should’ve been more on those guys’ cases about filling out their medical examination forms. Needless to say, they paid their dues post-race.” What sort of handicap DST will impose this year is anyone’s guess. “I’m considering doing something involving a piggyback, with actual pigs. I like the cut of Old Major’s jib, and he’s had some excellent results lately.” Probable ROTY Yves Sikubwabo joins past winners Andrew Nixon, Ross Proudfoot, and Aaron Hendrikx, and DST is particularily pleased about snagging B.C. boy Christian Gravel, who alongside Jeff Stone, make up two members of the legendary rock variant surname trio remniscent of the legendary birds from Pokemon. “Gotta catch ‘em all. And by them all, I mean all of the country’s top recruits.”

2. Queen’s – Make no mistake, Boyd’s battlion has been fiercely sharpening their horns this summer in hopes of taking the CIS cross country scene by storm. “Absolutely, we lost some solid runners last year,” coach Boyd commented, “But it’s nothing I can’t handle. When most of these boys come to me, they’re look more like wads of cookie dough than high-level endurance athletes. Two weeks into my program and their bodies are carved from wood.” No more is this true than with last year’s breakout star, Jeff Archer, who could very well end up in the individual medals this year. Suffice to say, he, McGraw, Patterson, Cashin, and Loney  are coming back bigger and badder than last year, and who knows what other cards Boyd is holding close to his chest. “I have a cornucopia of talent at my disposal. I have almost as many talented runners as I have capillary beds. And trust me, that’s a lot!”

3. Victoria – The Vikes are the west coast equivalent of the Guelph Gryphons, and they’re getting more and more like their east coast counterparts. They’re so good in fact, that they can’t even bother to use a full name for their school mascot. They’re getting so good that most of their team signs up while failing to notice the final “0” in the race distance listing. Haight is a distance demi-god and Cassidy is showing shades of his fictional counterpart, especially coming off his Jr Nats win last year. Hulse was claimed in free agency to fill the void left by Vike vet Childs, but later admitted he might have been a little hasty to leave Queen’s so quickly. “I’ve made a terrible mistake,” he elaborates. “He’s damn right he did!!” confirms Boyd. They should be in the hunt of a medal come November.

4. Laval – Another foreign (to Ontarians) team. These guys have serious momentum at their backs and it’s not the kind that comes from eating too much poutine. We asked standout Charles Philibert-Thiboutot, or “Chuck PT” as we’ve been told to call him, the secret to their success. “Usual Quebec things,” he said in a very thick, Jean Chrétien-inspired accent. “Maple syrup, separatism, and a ‘I’m better than you’ attitude.” Historically however, Frenchies have tended to fizzle as the season draws to a close, right when the other teams are ramping up. “At least we didn’t crash as badly as the Leafs did last year,” Chuck shoots back. Their other runners aren’t shabby either, notably Lapointe and Boisvert, and rooké Labranche has shown early promise as a potential scorer.

5. Windsor – Ouch. While the drop may seem a bit harsh, the losses of scorers de Groot, Aguanno, and Berkis justify the decision. True enough, Walters and Janikowski are serious contenders for medals at the individual level. But the rest of the nation’s elite have bridged the gap, leaving the once mighty Lancers looking more like the Black Knight from Monty Python and the Quest for the Holy Grail. Indeed a recruiting class including Pitcariu, Bellemore, Master, and Cooper looks promising for the future but first-year athletes being as chronically unreliable as they are can’t be relied upon to uphold this team’s once high prestige.

6. McMaster – If the nationals course sees a lot of rain this year and becomes water-logged, this team’s rank shoots up to #2 (still after Guelph of course). We bet that made coach Sneyd reconsider ever introducing his athletes to the idea of cross-training regime. Windsor standout of two years back Sanders and top recruit Darlington lead an already respectable team of triathlon studs including Reid and Morgan all of whom are looking to do some damage on the cross country front. Walsh is back and looking to contribute to this year's team, especially with regards to deciding their post-CIS attire. With the loss of Yorke, the addition of a burly grad student could be just what this team needs to put them into medal contention.

7. Western – Last year’s lackluster performance didn’t discourage the hosting Mustangs, and in fact, may have innervated them. “I’m in a bit of a dilemma,” commented coach Vigars. “We usually almost always peak for Mustang Invite, but since we’re hosting this year, our training schedule isn’t as clear cut.” The losses of O’Neill, Smith (graduated), and Andrin (injured.. surprise, surprise) hurt, but the return of the infamous 2:36 high school marathoner, Dill, and the incoming of former OFSAA champion Sayers will partially fill the void. Armstrong and Co. will have their work cut out for them if they wish to wow the hometown crowds early November.

8. Regina – Wiebe will not disappoint, unless he decides to not run like last year and/or opt out of Movember. Teammates Fyfe and Johnson will try to help carry this team as far as they can. It’s too bad the scores aren’t tabulated based on three runners’ places, or even one for that matter.