Cross-country is racing over long distances on flat or rolling ground. Run cross-country.
The mud is part of the sport rather than a complaint about it. Cross-country is run in winter, which is either the charm of it or the objection.
1nouncross-countryRacing over long distances on flat or rolling ground.
“Cross-country was compulsory and universally dreaded.”
cross-country is a sport.
Middle English
cross
English
cross
English, today
cross-country
From cross- + country. cross comes from Middle English cross. From Middle English cross, cros, from Old English cros (“rood, cross”), from Old Norse kross, from Old Irish cros, from Latin crux (crucī). In this sense displaced native Middle English rode, from Old English rōd (“cross”); see rood. a doublet of crouch and crux. Compare Welsh croes, Irish crois. The sense of "two intersecting lines drawn or cut on a surface; two lines intersecting at right angles" without regard to religious signification develops from the late 14th century.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA