Heading into the NCAA Women’s Cross Country Championship, Monday, March 15 in Stillwater, Okla., there were multiple reasons why NC State head coach Laurie Henes would have been happy with a second-place team finish.
The timing of the meet was not ideal. Because the NCAA chose not to hold championships in the fall, it was questionable if the race would even be competed. Ultimately, it was scheduled for March 15, literally two days after the Indoor Track and Field National Championships were held.
That meant for coaches like Henes,had to make a choice of whether or not to have their best distance runners compete in both or focus on one.
“I made some decisions early on to allow some people to do both, which some schools didn’t do,” Henes confirmed. “We had the full support of our administration.”
There was a compromise of sorts. NC State would have runners in the 5K and the distance medley relay at indoors, but not the mile or 3K. Freshman Katelyn Tuohy would have qualified in the latter, while junior Savannah Shaw would have done so in the former. Instead, those two helped with the distance medley that finished in seventh place to earn first-team All-America honors.
Senior Hannah Steelman and sophomore Kelsey Chmiel both wanted an opportunity to run the 5K, which was part of Henes’ motivation to let them compete in both meets. Steelman placed eighth in the indoor race for first team All-America accolades, and Chmiel was second-team after finishing in 11th.
When finished with their runs, the group hopped onto a bus from Fayetteville, Ark., site of the NCAA indoor track meet, to Tulsa, Okla., where a plane was dropping off the remainder of the cross country teams. From there they made their way to Stillwater, arriving the evening of Saturday, March 13.
Sunday was a rest day, with massage treatment available for recovery.
“I can’t say that there weren’t some thoughts of, ‘Did we overdo this?,’” Henes admitted.
The coach had another reason for wondering how well her team could place in the cross country meet. The star of the fall season — during which the Pack won its fifth straight ACC title — was senior Dominique Clairmonte, the conference champion.
Clairmonte, however, was diagnosed with mononucleosis in December, sidelining her until February. Then, on Feb. 16, just after Clairmonte felt “semi-normal,” she came down with either food poisoning or perhaps norovirus.
Whatever the cause, Clairmonte, in Henes’ description, “was knocked out.”
The loss of another week of training left Henes wondering if it was possible to enter Clairmonte in the NCAA Cross Country Championships.
“We basically thought we were going in without the ACC champion,” Henes noted.
Yet with 1K left in the 6K race, Clairmonte was running in the top 40, and more importantly NC State was in first place in the team standings, just ahead of BYU.
“I cannot express how proud I am of what she was able to do,” Henes said. “She was aggressive. She paid for it in the last 1,000 a little, but she was in the 30s with 20 days of training. I was shocked.
"She knew she wasn’t going to be in contention individually to be in the top 10 like she wanted to be. I think she realized that. She didn’t have the training, but she put that individual part aside and just gave everything she had for the team.
"That is what we are trying to do here, but to see it, I was just super proud of her.”
Sensing Clairmonte would have trouble keeping the pace, and keenly aware of the team standings, Henes and her assistant Chris Seaton found Shaw on the course.
“I know she heard us telling her, ‘You need to pass 30 people,’ and she did pass 30 people in that last 1,000,” Henes recalled.
Shaw’s late push was not enough to overcome BYU for the national title, but NC State was able to hold on to second place, matching the program’s best-ever finish.
The Wolfpack was in that position because of stellar performances from Steelman and Chmiel, plus the debut on a college cross country course of Tuohy, who was a highly touted and decorated high school runner,. She was Gatorade Female Athlete of the Year in 2018 and three times was selected as the Gatorade Female Cross Country Athlete of the Year (2017-19).
“I think Katelyn did an amazing job of hanging in there,” Henes said. “She had a few doubts beforehand, asking ‘Coach, do you think I am ready to run this?’
“I know she was hurting, but she was incredibly tough holding on in that last 1,000.”
Steelman and Chmiel finished fifth and 10th, respectively, while Tuohy came in 24th, best among freshmen in the meet. All three were named All-Americans.
Henes was not surprised that Steelman and Chmiel were able to turn around so quickly from the 5K race at the NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships and earn All-America finishes in cross country.
“A large part of running cross country and distance is making sure you manage your recovery well,” Henes noted. “And Hannah, Kelsey and Savannah do an amazing job of that.”
Henes is optimistic that everyone who ran in the NCAA meet will return for next fall, when, hopefully, there will be a normal cross country season. Expectations are likely to be high, and the coach thinks her team will be ready. She noted that a fully-trained Clairmonte would have likely finished with Steelman and Chmiel in the lead pack.
“If someone had said before the meet that we were going to be second, we all would have said, ‘Wow, that’s a good day,'" Henes noted. "With a 1,000 to go it looked like we still really had an opportunity to win it, so that was frustrating.
“I’m just super proud of everyone, especially the women who did both. It was a tough weekend, but they met that challenge head on.”
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