The Maroon is pleased to announce that Matt Cagigal and Richard Bouckaert, arguably the best duo to run on a Loyola track, as our Male Athletes of the Year.
The pair has impressed fans for over three years. They account for the second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth and 10th best times in Loyola 8-km. race history, an unprecedented dominance that should hold long after they graduate in May.
But perhaps their best performances came last semester at the Memphis Twilight Meet, where they finished within three seconds of each other with season-best times of 26:26.97 and 26:29.00. Cagigal, finance senior, finished ahead in that race – but that’s not always so.
“In a majority of the races we are stride for stride,” said Cagigal. “Someone actually commented that we put on a running clinic. We run the same stride. The majority of the five-mile races we are right next to each other.
“I’m more of a going-out-quicker runner, and then trying to hang on at the finish. His strategy is to go out at a good pace, with the competition, and then try to get faster each mile. This complements each other well,” Cagigal said.
Cagigal relies on Bouckaert to keep him from going out too fast. He often returns the favor, making sure that Bouckaert doesn’t start out too slow.
“It’s a pretty good check and balances with each other. I’m more conservative, and he’s more aggressive,” said Bouckaert.
That teamwork resulted in perhaps the best accomplishment of their careers: their achieving All-GCAC and All-NAIA Region XIII honors. Both received the accolades last semester after being invited to run in the NAIA National Championships.
In addition to sharing tendencies for breaking records, the duo also shared an apartment for several years. They planned class schedules together, practiced together and even cooked together.
“We run 70 miles a week in the fall, so sometimes we’re too tired to eat. But we have to,” said Cagigal when asked about mixing school and sports. “It’s basically time management. If you have something hard to do the next day, you do it before practice.”
But remarkably, the two rarely fight despite being together at almost all times, said Bouckaert. “We just know each other. It’s not like having a girlfriend. We don’t get on each other’s nerves.”
In fact, the two are so involved with one another that they avoid frivolous rivalries by not wasting time and energy at practice, said Cagigal.
“Strangely, we haven’t raced at practice. That’s rare. I think that’s because we live with each other and are such good friends.
“We’ve probably ran 8000 miles together, so it’d be hard to be mad at each other (over a race) at practice and then run.”
When they are forced to separate after the May graduation, they’ll have to learn, separately, how to move on and start their lives.
“It’s going to be weird not living with each other. Text messaging will probably go up for the first couple months,” said Cagigal, who plans on returning to Oklahoma to work at Chesapeake Energy. Bouckaert, on the other hand, plans on taking paralegal classes at the University of New Orleans and getting a job at a law firm.
Regardless of their departures, Loyola isn’t going to forget them or their accomplishments anytime soon.
“It’d be weird to [be Male Athlete of the Year] if it were just one of us,” said Bouckaert. “It’s appropriate.”
Chad Bower can be reached at [email protected].
