Junior Lisa Heinonen worked her way onto the distance squad last year after spending her first two years on the University’s club team. Heinonen said she is very familiar with the venue for Friday’s race – her father Tom Heinonen, the club team’s coach, designed the trail named after Oregon running legend Steve Prefontaine.
“I’m really excited. People in Eugene always ask, ‘Where’s your home course?’ And we haven’t had one in eight years,” Heinonen said. “Having a meet come back is really exciting for people to see and to be a part of.”
Heinonen said she expects the race to start off a little slowly.
“It’s not particularly fast terrain or anything. The start of the race is going to be pretty bumpy,” Heinonen said.
The Bill Dellinger Invitational will be the first meet held in Eugene since the Oregon Invitational in 1998. The event, held at Alton Baker Park, will be the first time collegiate athletes have run “Pre’s Trail” during a competition. The runners in the women’s field include Heinonen and fellow Eugene natives, junior Sarah Pearson and freshman Lauren Zaludek. The No. 30 Ducks will take on a talented field that includes No. 5 BYU, No. 7 Duke and Pac-10 conference foe Washington. The women’s race will begin Friday at 5:20 p.m., followed by the men’s at 6 p.m..
Pearson has run in the top four in all nine of her races the past two years and figures to be in the mix Friday as well as the rest of the year. Pearson started running as a sophomore at South Eugene high school and said she is excited to have an opportunity to run in front of her family and friends.
“My family and a lot of my friends are coming,” Pearson said. “A lot of times a meet like this is held in Indiana, where people can’t fly all the way over there. I’m excited because a lot of my friends haven’t seen me race before.”
Zaludek finished fifth in the 3A state final last year for local Elmira High School. She said she is enjoying being a part of an Oregon program on the rise.
“I’m really excited,” Zaludek said. “It’s my first year here and a meet is returning for the first time in a while.”
Zaludek said she is confident the team can continue improving and move up in the national rankings.
“We are No. 30 right now, and I’m sure we can do better,” Zaludek said.
The Ducks trio all performed well in their season opening meet Sept. 8, at Pier Park in Portland. Pearson led the way with a fourth place finish, followed by Zaludek in sixth and Heinonen in ninth.
Pearson said she looks forward to running on Friday against some very elite competition.
“It’s good, it’s hard, but it’s definitely good to be out there with the nation’s best,” Pearson said. “If I looked across the nation, this is where I would pick to go to school because of the way the program is heading.”
The Oregon men enter Friday’s race ranked No. 15 in the nation. The team will be led by sophomores Galen Rupp and University of New Mexico transfer Shadrack Kiptoo-Biwott. The men will find competition on Friday in No. 5 Texas, No. 7 Portland and No. 11 BYU.
Regardless of who comes out on top Friday, all of the meet’s participants will be involved in something special. Cross country is returning to the running capital of the world, Tracktown, USA.
And when the gun goes off and the race begins, three local products will get to continue the great running tradition of Eugene, along a trail named after, arguably, the greatest Duck of all time.
Pearson said she is well versed in the history of Oregon running and is thankful that she is a part of its resurgence.
“There is a lot of buzz around Oregon running,” she said. “It hasn’t been like this since the days of Coach Dellinger, Prefontaine and the McChesney’s.”