In Beantown for the New England Championships

After a week with no competition, the UConn men's cross country team will jump back into action with the New England Championships.

The team will travel to Boston this Saturday for a 1:30 p.m. start. The top seven runners that will compete are Will Sanders, Scott Johnson, Myles Udland, Nick Aguila, Artem Skobrev, Ryan King and Brian Gagnon.

"This weekend kind of signals the start of the second half of our season where the races are a little bit more important, so I'm excited about that," said Myles Udland, a 1st-semester English major. "The past ten days have been pretty hard … but I feel like we are really prepared for the upcoming weekend. I'm hoping to be top 50 and I think the time will take care of itself if I can accomplish that place goal."

Assistant coach Rich Miller continues to steer his team in a positive direction with a well-designed practice schedule that includes hilly workouts and longer intervals. "The week off has been very beneficial in terms of getting us ready for this meet. Our top seven runners and the team as a whole continue to run better as a unit."

After finishing first for the Huskies at the Connecticut College meet, coach Miller keeps Gagnon's game plan essentially the same.

"Brian shouldn't be too anxious in the first half of the race, but should be very aggressive and run the second half as well as anyone in the race," said Miller.

"I'm feeling well prepared for the meet this weekend," said Gagnon, a 9th-semester sociology major. "Taking last weekend off gave my legs a rest from racing. We had a really good workout on Tuesday. We went down to Mansfield Hollow and ran on the trails and got a quality workout in. The rest of the week was just easy running and trying to keep my weekly mileage up. This weekend is more of just executing the race plan that my coaches and I have come up with. The better I execute, the better my time and place will be."

This meet will mark the first time all of the elite runners compete in the same race this season. After taking on all 47 New England teams last year, the Huskies look to make up for a 30th-place finish last year.