Hoosiers prep for George Mason Invite Saturday

After one exhibition and one meet in which not all top runners competed, the IU men's cross country team pumps itself up for its first full-fledged race of the season. Saturday the Hoosiers visit Manassas, Va., for the George Mason Invitational, where the first meet to showcase the team's top seven runners will take place.\n"The three weeks between the last meet (the Indiana Open) and our next meet, George Mason, are the hardest three weeks of the year by far," assistant coach Stephen Haas said. "Everybody's at their peak mileage. Everybody's doing their longest runs, and we're starting to really turn it on with the workouts."\nHaas said the weeks leading up to the invite have been important, adding that he and the other coaches wanted the runners to push themselves the entire time with good, solid effort.\nThere are four runners who will don the cream and crimson for the first time this year.\nFreshman Jordan Kyle, sophomores Mark Fruin and Tim McLeod and senior Marcus Aguilar will officially start their season with the rest of the top seven at the invitational. Despite the high expectations facing them, Kyle isn't worried.\n"For the four of us, it's an opener, and I think for everyone else who's already had a few races under their belts this will be another really good experience to get out there and race people," he said. "That will be our opening meet, and along with everybody else on the team, we've been running high mileage."\nDespite being what Haas referred to as an "all-out race," the course itself may present its own set of challenges to overcome. Fruin noted that though he has not been there before, it is supposed to be a challenging course. However, similarities between IU's course and George Mason's have helped him prepare for the race, he said.\n"It's kind of hilly, which will hopefully play into our favor," Fruin said.\nFruin added that he hopes the team will be running together and leading the pack.\nBecause the IU cross country team only granted one athletic scholarship this season, most of the runners compete simply for the love of the sport, Haas said.\n"On our team we have only one scholarship athlete, so a lot of runners are out there not because of that," Haas said. "It's because they want to do it. That's what they're good at. They're not putting in all this time and effort for no reason. It's a team, and it's individual-based, and if everybody does well individually, we're going to do well as a team"