It's a Saturday morning on the road and CWRU cross
country runner Matt Finnerty is sitting down playing a piano
in the hotel lobby. A far more relaxing setting than a few hours
later when he will be standing among 150 runners at a start-finish
line awaiting a gun shot to launch an eight kilometer race.
Matt Finnerty
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"Just before that gun goes off you get a pretty
nervous feeling," Finnerty said. "But as soon as it goes off,
that feeling goes away, and you just think about taking care
of business."
His business so far this year has been music to
the ears of the CWRU community. Finnerty, a junior from Poland,
Ohio, has been running past his opponents. He began the season
winning the first three races and has continued to be a top-tier
finisher.
So what has been his secret, the same pair of
dirty socks?
"A lot of runners have superstitions," Finnerty
said. "I just try to stay relaxed and focused. I do have a routine,
which includes warming up at a certain time before, doing the
same stretches, but nothing extreme. I do wash my jersey and
socks."
Success is not unfamiliar to Finnerty. At Cardinal
Mooney High School in Youngstown, Ohio, Matt was an All-State
selection his senior year (1999), when his team won the Division
II state title. Last year as a sophomore at CWRU, he was a first
team All-University Athletic Association selection and a member
of the All-Great Lakes Region and Division III All-Ohio teams.
Finnerty also has won four UAA Athlete of the Week honors during
his tenure, including two this season.
"This year I want to win the UAA," he said. "I
wanted to win it last year, and I got fourth. The UAA is always
very competitive-there are a lot of really good runners in it-but
I would like to put myself in a position to win it."
To win the UAA championship on November 2 at New
York University in New York City is one objective, but the team
and Matt's biggest goal is to make the NCAA championships November
23 at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minn. That is something
that hasn't happened since 1994 when CWRU sent three individuals
to the NCAAs.
"The UAA is great, and that would be a little
notch in the belt, I suppose. But the nationals is where the
team and I would like to go," Finnerty said.
The Spartans and Finnerty hope to be at nationals
this fall or at least next year during Finnerty's senior year.
But life will go on either way, and this student-athlete has
something else in mind. Finnerty is a physics major at CWRU
who initially came to University Circle with plans to do research
but now thinks he would like to teach at either the secondary
or university level.
"I found out just in helping my friends with homework,
or getting help, that I think it is something I would really
enjoy doing," he said.
Would that occupation also include the title of
coach?
"Actually that is one of the big incentives,"
Finnerty said. "I really think a coaching/teaching title is
something I would greatly enjoy for a long period of time."
