Bill McCurdy and Jim Tuppeny, the cross country coaches for Harvard and Penn, are not bosom buddies. To say they are enemies is to exaggerate. Nor are they indifferent to each other, though they seem to pretend that they are. I guess it is most accurate to say that they are feverish rivals.

Both have built powerful cross country teams with different techniques, but Tuppeny's a relatively new face in Ivy circles, and Penn's climb toward the top began only a few years ago. Penn had never beaten Harvard in a dual meet.

Saturday in Van Cortlandt Park, as McCurdy, one of the nation's best conditioned 58-year-olds, jogged in his sweats from the one-mile point to the two-mile point, he did not know what was about to happen. After one mile, his top three were reportedly participating, too.

At the two-mile point, where the runners come out of the woods to cross a bridge, stood Jim Tuppeny. McCurdy came to a stop 20 yards away from Tuppeny and talked for a moment to Pappy Hunt, Harvard's freshman coach. But he couldn't continue to ignore Tupeny's presence, so he walked over to exchange greetings.

You could figure out their relationship without much effort. "Hot day," Tuppeny offered as an opener. McCurdy agreed, of course. And the discussion went on from there, for about 20 seconds. Now all they had to worry about was shaking hands after the race.

There was even a sharp visual contrast between the two. Tuppeny in his blue blazer with the "U of P" in red on the pocket, stopwatch in hand. The technician. Authoritarian, McCurdy stood next to him in his grey sweatsuit, sweating. He had a beard on his face. For a Harvard fan, the contrast was easily categorized. They were crew coaches Joe Burk and Harry Parker, or even the scheming Lex Luther and Superman, who stood for truth, justice, and maybe even the American way.

Tuppeny is most known for his energetic recruiting. He has courted most of the nation's top high school runners in past years, first as Jumbo Elliot's assistant at Villanova and now as Penn's head man. His efforts have rewarded him well, and this year he has a freshman named Dennis Fikes, a true phenomenon. Getting the talent is the heart of his coaching, and then with his guidance, the boys do the rest.

McCurdy, on the other hand, has not had to worry much about recruiting. He sits in Dillon Field House, and the high school stars come to him because Harvard has a track reputation and offers nice extras like girls, a good location, and education. Once the runners are here, though, he pushes them as they've never been pushed before, and builds winning teams.

Things are changing, though. Princeton and Yale are now coed, and other colleges are quickly improving their education and track facilities. Harvard is no longer everyone's goal.

And the changing climate became apparent at the two-mile point Saturday when Penn runners swarmed out of the woods after Harvard's Tom Spengler. Eventually, one by one, the rest of the Crimson team trickled out of the woods. As McCurdy jogged off to yell encouragement to his runners, a great sense of satisfaction must have warmed Tuppeny as took the scene in. He had won the day's battle, and perhaps more.

So now Harvard must regroup, toughen itself mentally, for revenge at the Heptagonals a month from today in the same place. Mike Koerner and Marshall Jones must recover from injuries.

What does Penn expect? "Tup doesn't let us talk about those things," captain Julio Piazza said Saturday.