“My mile time had never been under 4:35 and my goal for our last track meet before the (Pennsylvania) state meet was to get at least 4:30 in order to qualify for state,” Smith said. “I was really nervous, but a friend from another private school whom I usually don’t run against was there. So, I just followed him out and passed him at the end and broke my personal record by ten seconds.”

After leaving his Pittsburgh high school with a spiffy new mile time of 4:25, Smith hopes to improve his times even more this year in San Francisco, where he will no longer have to don boots and ski clothes to run during the winter. “I love the weather here,” he raved. “It’s perfect for running. My goal for this cross-country season is to come in among the top 25 at state.” Coach Michael Prutz knows that Smith will have a bright season ahead of him in San Francisco. “Based on his times, he would have won our city meet last year,” he said. “He’s a good addition to our team.”

Smith’s presence seems appropriate — the team as a whole has kicked it up a notch since last year. The Lowell Invitational, traditionally the team’s first meet of the season, looms tomorrow, coming on the heels of a challenging preseason meet and four weeks of intense workouts. “Normally we kick off the season with Lowell Invite,” senior runner Yoongi Tom said. “We started off the season much harder than we usually do, so maybe it’ll show up in our first meet.”

Brian Ho The sun shines brightly down on the cross country team as they scamper off into the distance on to another intense endurance workout.

About 22 members of the team ran at the Sacred Heart Invitational at the Polo Fields on Sept. 7, but the absence of the team’s top runners meant that Lowell’s fastest runners at the meet, sophomore Carlin Lee and senior Cynthia Leung, placed sixth at best in their respective divisions.

Prutz started off practices this year at a faster pace after advising returning runners to run over the summer.

Despite his warning, many of the veterans still feel the intensity of workouts. “Prutz has been trying to make up for lost time from the summer and push us to a level we should be at,” senior Sati Houston said. “Even if we are veterans, we’ve still never ran at this level this early on in the season.”

On any given day, the team may be running the Great Highway, speeding up hills or doing lunges in every direction imaginable to build muscle. While these practices are guaranteed to make even a veteran’s muscles feel the burn, many newbies are learning to grit their teeth and power through them.

“The hardest practice was the pyramid run around the lake,” freshman Stuart Minshull said, referring to a 32-minute set of running and jogging intervals. “It was refreshing, but when I tried to get out of bed the next day, I fell over.”

Prutz apologized to the new runners but added, “A couple freshmen came with experience, so they’ll be ahead of the game.”

Though counting on star runners — including freshmen Rachel Hwang and Aaron Hill, sophomores Carlin Lee and Diana Zhen and senior co-captains Alex Chan and Alexis Kim, as well as Smith — to lead the way, Prutz is also excited about the team as a whole.

“We have a good mix of seniors and underclassmen,” he said. “I’ve been seeing runners in their little groups of friends but also being competitive with each other and kind of jockeying for position. Hopefully that will show through at our meets (because) we didn’t see a lot of that last year.”

Last year’s team also lacked an older female role model. However, the position has been happily filled this season by Wellness Center coordinator Alicia Rozum, a triathlete. “I’m really excited about being their assistant cross country coach,” she said. “I ran cross country in high school, and running has become a big part of my own training.”

A personal trainer and spinning instructor, Rozum is looking forward to coaching with Prutz. “It’s going to be an unusual combination of training styles because Mr. Prutz is an extremely accomplished runner and I’m really active in the training field, so we both have a real personal interest in what we do,” she said.

In the meantime, the team is looking forward to kicking off its season at tomorrow’s invitational. “We have a lot of new runners, so it’ll be a race to see where everyone’s at,” Chan said. “Hopefully some good results will come out of it.”

The Lowell Invitational starts at 10 a.m. tomorrow at the Polo Fields in Golden Gate Park