Great Danes and Best Friends: Men's Cross Country's Harrsen and Jensen

The first thing Anton Harrsen noticed about Kristian Jensen was his curly hair.

Jensen was standing on the track getting ready to run when Harrsen met him for the first time. They were both starting their first year at Aarhus University where they would be roommates and training partners.

"The coach told me about Anton and said that he had run some nice times and we would probably tag along," said Jensen. "I had no idea who he was. I had never heard of him. He had never heard of me."

One year later, the Denmark natives are "inseparable" and have made their way to Philadelphia where they are making a name for themselves on Temple's cross country team.

Between the two of them, Jensen and Harrsen have two top-five finishes and three top-10 finishes so far this season. Jensen took second at the Temple Invitational and fifth at the Rider Invitational, while Harrsen placed fifth and eighth in those two races, respectively.

When Jensen and Harrsen first met, Jensen had already been in touch with head coach James Snyder, but Harrsen had never even heard of Temple.

Snyder first heard about Jensen when he competed in the European Cross Country Championships in 2015. After that race, he continued to keep tabs on the Danish runner. They stayed in touch via skype, email and Facebook. Snyder made Jensen an offer as soon as he could.

"He was someone who was highly recruited by a lot of schools in the NCAA," Snyder said. "If you put him into the American high school system, last year would have been his senior year of high school and he was faster than anyone here in the States. So that was really impressive."

Shortly after the 2016 European Championships, Jensen made his official commitment to Temple. Not long after that, Harrsen, who never thought going abroad would be an option for him, got hooked on the idea.

"Kristian showed me pictures of Philadelphia and of the city and the team," said Harrsen. "He also showed me some times and all that and I got really hooked on the idea. But I didn't know Temple at all, not even by reputation, before I met Kristian."

After hearing Snyder was potentially looking for another runner for the men's team, Harrsen sent him an email telling him about himself, his training and his times.

"Snyder was really clear about it actually," Harrsen said. "He was like, 'Ya you have to run faster.' And he gave me some times that he wanted me to beat."

In order to do that, Anton had to travel abroad to race. It was after a race in Sweden that everything started to come together. He emailed Snyder his times and a couple days later, he heard back.

"When he had run 14:32 in the 5K in Sweden that's when I knew he had made a huge jump," said Snyder. "I knew at the very least he would come in and be at least a top five guy for us in cross country."

After talking it over, Snyder gave him a call and made it official. Harrsen was on the team.

The first thing he did was run around his house and try to find an American flag his parents had gotten on one of their trips to the United States. Once he found it he took a picture with it and sent it to Jensen.

"I got a text from him," said Jensen. "It was a picture where he was holding an American flag and it was pretty weird, but he looked really happy. Then I called him and he told me that he committed and I started jumping up and down. I was so happy."

"It's just like you're going to this weird place, somewhere you've never been before and then you get to bring your best buddy," added Jensen. "It's amazing. I was so happy."

Now that they're at Temple, they are as grateful as ever to have each other.

Harrsen helps Jensen with the language.

"I'm not that good with the English language so I get misunderstood a bit," said Jensen. "And then it's good to have someone that understands why you sound stupid."

Jensen helps Harrsen when it comes to reassuring him that he belongs here.

"Now that I've come to Temple I really have to prove myself in front of the other guy," said Harrsen. "But Kristian was really nice to say, 'Anton you're doing a good job. You don't have to stress about it.' And he was really comforting me there so I could focus on the training instead of stressing every time we had practice."

Jensen and Harrsen may be new to Philadelphia, but they have already visited the Rocky steps and eaten cheesesteaks. As for visiting the Liberty Bell, they haven't gotten there yet but Harrsen makes a correlation to their cross country careers.

"We are saving some things," he said. "We are going to be here for four years so we need to save some of the good stuff for later."

Temple University Athletics

Great Danes and Best Friends: Men's Cross Country's Harrsen and Jensen

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