Now I know cross country is not the sexiest sport to brag about. At Christmas break this year, I doubt anyone, talking to a friend from a rival school, will be saying “so what our football team got shut out? Did you see that our cross country team ran faster than your team?”

But the men’s and women’s cross country teams are programs of which students should be proud. None of us should feel ridiculous reminding people of State’s running prowess, even if football and basketball are in the dumps.

DominantThe men’s and women’s cross country programs have been, by far, the most consistently successful sports at the University. The men, with 14 conference championships, have the best record in the ACC. The team has finished in the top 10 nationally nine times since 1984 when the team first placed in the top 10.

The women’s team has been even more dominant. In the 30 years the ACC has held a conference championship for women’s cross country, the Wolfpack has claimed 21 of those titles. UNC-Chapel Hill, the team with the next highest number of wins, has claimed three.

Coaching both the men’s and women’s teams, Rollie Geiger has accumulated 32 ACC championships. It would be scary to think about N.C. State athletics without him. Since he took over in 1979, State has won 70 ACC titles among all of its team sports. Wins during Geiger’s tenure account for 54 percent of those championships.

BraniacsThe award for the Wolfpack team with the highest grade point average is never much of a contest. Cross country, with team GPAs consistently more than 3.0, has virtually owned this category in the past decade. Maybe it is something about runners that makes them more driven than normal people, but the cross country program should be praised for having an outstanding academic reputation.

They never restWhile most student athletes enjoy something resembling an off-season, cross country runners share no such luxury. After the fall season, the runners compete in the indoor track season during the winter and outdoor track season in the spring.

By the time summer rolls around, it is time to prepare for the fall again. This type of non-stop schedule can be brutal. The women’s team members typically run 60 miles per week, and the men each run 80 miles.

Purest of sportsIs there a sport more fundamentally human than cross country? Our species, being bipedal, walks and runs. A running competition between people is like a competition of fish swimming. It is a test of the most essential of human talents.

While football, basketball and baseball get the most attention, their history pales in comparison to the history of cross country running.

So, next time you overhear someone trashing our revenue sports, you can tell yourself “who cares about football when you have cross country?”