Brigham Young University was ready for the N.C.A.A. Division I cross-country championships on Saturday. It had strong men’s and women’s teams that had each won the Big 12 championship.
But there was a challenge facing B.Y.U. and all the other entrants. The day of the race in Verona, Wis., was going to be pretty cold, with a temperature in the mid-to-high 30s. That would make things less than pleasant for runners in shorts and singlets.
B.Y.U. had a plan both innovative and ancient: having the runners slather their bodies in olive oil, in what the men’s coach, Ed Eyestone, called “an old-school running trick.”
“We’ve done it every year if its cold,” said the women’s coach, Diljeet Taylor. “It’s a trick. You don’t see a lot of people doing it.”
“I used it as an athlete many times,” Eyestone said. I won the N.C.A.A title 40 years ago wearing some brown gardening gloves and bare arms and shorts. That was a much worse day. I used olive oil.”
B.Y.U.’s trick was very likely theirs alone at this year’s championships. “I would guess we were the only ones using it,” Eyestone said. “I don’t see it as much anymore.”
B.Y.U. coaches applied the oil to the runners’ legs, backs and arms five minutes before the start, just as the sweats were coming off, while offering last-minute words of encouragement.
So why olive oil? “It keeps the legs warm,” Taylor said. In a race where runners wear shorts, she added, “your legs are going to be exposed.”
“It insulates your skin and really protects from losing heat and also offers wind protection,” she said
But before you go buy a bottle, know that it may not be perfect for all race distances and weather conditions. Eyestone recommends the olive oil coating for races that are less than a half-hour long. (The fastest runners finished the men’s 10K race in a little over 28 and a half minutes. The winner of women’s 6K race crossed the finish line in a little over 19 minutes.) For marathons, wearing more layers is a smarter idea, he said.
Eyestone also thinks that olive oil works better in moderately cold conditions, as in Wisconsin on Saturday. “Had it been zero degrees, the guys would have had undershirts and layers,” he said. “For skiing, I’d never do this.”
But, he added, “for a moderately cold day, less than 30 minutes, it’s an interesting thing to say, ‘We’re going old school today.’ It gives them a little extra layer of insulation, and maybe a secret weapon.”
Even today, the method is not unheard-of, particularly in the Midwest, where it gets awfully cold by November, when cross-country season typically ends.
More common is Vaseline, and swimmers of the English Channel — like Gertrude Ederle in 1926 — were said to have used lard. Eyestone cautioned that Vaseline is a lot harder to get off after a race than olive oil.
A high temperature in the 30s is nothing to hardy cross-country runners, who often find themselves in far worse conditions. “When I won in 1984, it was worse,” Eyestone said. “It had snowed. Many were wearing hats and gloves, undershirts and tights.”
The B.Y.U. men also won the national title in 2019, also bathed in olive oil. “It was raining, very cold, miserable, worse conditions,” Eyestone said. “We’ve had a couple of years when the wind chill was negative: Iowa, Indiana; biting, biting cold.”
Eyestone said that once when he was running at the U.S. winter cross-country nationals in Missoula, Mont., his mustache froze.
As for the 2024 race, the B.Y.U. women followed Taylor’s strategy: “Get out with urgency, in the middle be patient, and in final third, urgency again.”
“We got out really well,” she said, “then went back a little. Most coaches might panic; for me, that brought comfort.” The women won by 17 points over West Virginia.
B.Y.U.’s men took a different tack than usual, though the olive oil probably wasn’t the reason. “Typically, we’re going to come from behind.” Eyestone said. “But our guys got out very well.”
Iowa State made up ground, and the lead started to shrink. At the finish, B.Y.U. hung on to win by 13 points.
It was the first men’s and women’s sweep since the University of Colorado in 2004.
As unusual as the olive oil method may seem, some of the very first athletes in recorded history swore by it.
The ancient Greeks often competed in a coating of olive oil at the Olympics, though for different reasons than B.Y.U.’s team, given the warmer clime of the Mediterranean. The oil served as sunscreen of a sort, and the athletes also believed it would bring them good luck and strength.
So is there a downside at all to olive-oil-anointed running? Eyestone said, “You come across the line smelling like a pizza.”
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