When the men’s cross country team toes the line Saturday morning in the Roy Griak Invitational meet in Minneapolis, its runners will get a chance to see how they stack up against some of the top teams in the country.

The meet will include three teams ranked in the top 10 in the preseason U.S. Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association poll, most notably No. 1 Wisconsin. Other top-25 ranked teams in the meet include No. 8 Arizona, No. 10 Kansas, No. 20 Arizona State, and host No. 23 Minnesota.

After strong performances in its first two meets, Iowa State received some votes in the USCCCA preseason poll and hopes to get another strong performance this weekend to propel the team into the rankings.

Coach Corey Ihmels said the effort from his team in this meet last year was good, but the team was still young. Iowa State took 16th in a field of 27 teams in 2005.

“I think we ran solid last year, but five of the seven we ran were freshmen,” he said.

With more experience under the team’s belt, Ihmels said he looks forward to the opportunity to compete in this first big meet of the year.

“It’s a good opportunity to go head-to-head against some ranked teams,” Ihmels said. “Obviously, we want to finish higher than we did last year and beat some ranked teams. It’ll give us a better idea of where we sit nationally.”

The Cyclones will also get their first look at Big 12 teams Baylor, Kansas, Kansas State, Missouri, Nebraska and Oklahoma. Although Kansas is the only ranked team from the Big 12 in the meet, the conference isn’t considered weak. Colorado is ranked third nationally, Texas fifth and Oklahoma State ninth. They all join Kansas as teams ranked in the top 10, making the Big 12 arguably the toughest conference in the country.

To move into the rankings, the team will need to best this year’s field of 36 teams, which should prove to be a difficult task.

However, Ihmels expressed great confidence in his runners’ work ethic and training abilities to this point in the season.

“As a whole, everyone has been pretty solid, which is a good sign because we’re in a heavy training phase,” Ihmels said. “The work ethic has been really good, so I’ve been really happy with that.”

Senior Jon Reis, who took 114th place last year, said the size of the field at this meet makes it an exciting race.

“It was neat to go there and get to run against the best [runners], it kind of made you run a little faster,” Reis said.

Sophomore Kiel Uhl, who finished the 8K race in 15th place last year, agreed it is an exciting race and said he is anxious for both himself and the team to prove what they are capable of.

“If we can place in the top seven, people will think we’re a little better and hopefully we’ll get a better ranking,” Uhl said.

Uhl added the challenge of a meet like this is what he trains all year for.

“I think it’s really exciting to actually go after it and run against some of the best runners in the country,” Uhl said. “Having those really good teams running with us will give us a little more inspiration hopefully.”