Mandrell, Marol Honored at All-Ohio Championships
10/13/2011 12:00:00 AM | Men's Cross Country
Oct. 13, 2011
By Gail Goldmuntz
CEDARVILLE, Ohio - The honors may have come a year after the fact, but Miami University's men's cross country team picked up two awards for the 2010 season at the 2011 All-Ohio Championships, held on Sept. 30. Head coach Warren Mandrell and his coaching staff was named 2010 Ohio Cross Country Coaching Staff of the Year while redshirt sophomore Matt Marol was named 2010 Ohio Cross Country Freshman of the Year.
Marol earned the award after placing 16th at last year's All-Ohio Championship, clocking a personal-best time 24:58.8 as the top-finishing freshman in the race. Mandrell and his staff captured the honor by leading the RedHawks to the team title among the 37-team field at the 2010 All-Ohio Championship, including nine Division I teams. The award was the first for Mandrell and his staff since the 1998 season while Marol is the first Miami freshman to win the accolade since Ernie Ziegler won the award in 1997.
"Matt has tremendous work ethic and he's gotten to where he is because he is willing to pound it out and really put in the volume," said Mandrell. "Out of high school he was a real solid runner, but he was not all-state or anything like that. He's one who actually really enjoys running five miles instead of three miles and he'll average during the season 75-85 miles a week."
Marol was a leading force for the RedHawks throughout 2010 as well. He finished 32nd overall at the 2010 MAC Championships in a time of 25:40.1, as Miami's fifth scorer, and took fourth overall at the Miami Invitational. He suffered an injury over the summer while running upwards of 95 miles a week in training and has slowly been returning to form for the 2011 season. In his two races this season, he was seventh at the LSU Invitational with a time of 27:31.7 and finished 66th at this year's All-Ohio Championship with a time of 26:33.76, running on just six days rest.
"Even when he got hurt, he was still doing cross training two hours a day. He was in the pool, riding the bike, doing the elliptical for two hours a day," Mandrell said. "He'd do a morning session and then a night session and now that he's back training, he still does a morning session cross training then an afternoon session of running. So he's incredibly work-ethic minded."
Mandrell, who is in his 18th season as the coach of the RedHawks, adds the Coaching Staff of the Year Award to an already impressive resume. Mandrell's cross country teams have not finished lower than fourth in the Mid-American Conference since 1996, winning a pair conference titles in 1997 and 1998. Last year, he guided them to a tie for second place at the MAC meet, equaling Kent State for the top finisher among the six MAC teams in Ohio.
"They were just a good team who ran well pretty much all season," Mandrell said of his 2010 squad. "The All-Ohio meet was their best combined performance of the whole season where everybody was either right on or close to their best time of the season. Three of our top five had their best performance of the year at that meet so obviously that played a huge role."
Both awards are voted on by the collegiate coaches at the 47 four-year colleges and universities in the state of Ohio who have a cross country team. The awards are presented by Ohio's cross country coaches in each division and are awarded at the following year's All-Ohio Championships. Criteria for the awards is strongly based on All-Ohio Championship results but also takes into consideration how an athlete or team does throughout the season, including conference and regional championships.
--MURedHawks.com--