Canadian Working and Below Armour have teamed up for the 2024 Canadian U Sports activities cross-country season to focus on a number of the prime homegrown skills throughout the nation. Every week, main as much as the 2024 U Sports activities Cross-Nation Championships in Kelowna, B.C., in November, Canadian Working will choose the highest athlete because the Below Armour Athlete of the Week.
The award will go to a U Sports activities cross-country athlete who achieved a standout efficiency at their meet. These athletes will probably be featured on Canadian Working and awarded an Below Armour prize pack that includes the brand new UA Infinite Professional Path shoe. This week we’re protecting the primary two weeks of the season, and highlighting two sensational athletes: Jacob Benoit of Dalhousie College and Madelyn Eybergen of the College of Windsor, for his or her performances between Sept. 7 and Sept. 21.
Jacob Benoit, Dalhousie College (AUS)
After taking first place on the STFX Invitational in Antigonish, N.S., on Saturday, Dalhousie’s Jacob Benoit has so far gone undefeated within the 2024 cross-country season. He accomplished the lads’s 8K course in 25:04, profitable over second place by greater than 50 seconds. He additionally received the Acadia Invitational in Greenwich, N.S., on Sept. 7, clocking 26:54.
The Windsor, N.S., native is in his second yr finishing his MBA. “I’m pleased with how the race went,” he informed Canadian Working. “I did my undergrad at St. Francis Xavier College, so I’m fairly accustomed to that course. I attempted to get out quick for the primary couple of laps, after which ease in a bit extra with about 4 km to go.”
Final yr, Benoit received the AUS convention title for the primary time, however on the 2023 U Sports activities Championships in London, Ont., he missed the rostrum by a single spot. “This yr, I’m aiming to get particular person and staff wins on the AUS degree, and enhance my efficiency in Kelowna for a podium spot on the U Sports activities Championships in Kelowna,” he reveals.
2024 males’s U Sports activities cross nation pre-season energy rankings
Madelyn Eybergen, College of Windsor (OUA)
At Saturday’s Vigars & Salter Western Invitational in London, Ont., College of Windsor’s Madelyn Eybergen received the ladies’s 8K race. She dominated final yr’s U Sports activities championship course, clocking 29:50 to beat second place by 10 seconds–in her first-ever cross-country race.
Saying Eybergen has had an unconventional introduction to cross-country could be an understatement. The graduate scholar, solely in her second yr of U Sports activities eligibility, was initially recruited to the Lancers monitor and discipline staff for the 2020-21 college yr–however not as an endurance athlete. The Kincardine, Ont., native comes from a high-jump background, and wrote on Instagram that she hadn’t taken half in a cross-country race since Grade 9.
“I really feel nice about my race,” Eybergen informed Canadian Working. “I used to be not anticipating to win, contemplating it was my first cross-country race. I discovered after the truth that the ladies I beat had been prime athletes for OUAs and U Sports activities [in 2023].” Eybergen’s efficiency marks the primary time a Lancer has received that race in additional than 30 years.
After coping with accidents throughout her main years at UWindsor, Eybergen says she constructed her energy again as much as return to competing. “I raced the mile for enjoyable on the first competitors of the 2024 indoor season,” she says. The previous excessive jumper explains that she continued to compete for each mid-distance and excessive bounce for the rest of the indoor season earlier than transitioning fully to mid- and long-distance occasions over the summer season.
“Firstly of the season, my purpose was to coach as finest as I may and see how properly I may do,” Eybergen admits. “Now, after the race this previous weekend, my purpose is to make it to U Sports activities and shoot for a medal.”
2024 ladies’s U Sports activities cross nation pre-season energy rankings
