Photo by Nick Kalaw
Contributor
The varsity cross country team ran its first race of the season at the Woodbridge Invitational, setting a multitude of new personal record, on Friday, Sept. 20. The boys team placed fifth out of 29 schools, while the girls placed ninth overall out of 35 teams.
Although top runner sophomore Sydney Morrow was out with a sickness, the girls team still delivered a stellar performance. Sophomore Mai Koyama ran a personal best of 18:21.9, placing fifth out of 198 runners. Junior Lindsay Michels, sophomore Lilian Zhu, and Amelia Jarolim followed, clocking in personal best times of 19:11.6 (41st), 19:41.6 (72nd), and 19:46.2 (76th), respectively. Senior Amber Gonzalez-Pacheco finished in 19:59.8 (91st), while junior Luyang Zhang ran a 20:44.6 (126th) and sophomore Miranda Liu came in shortly after with a 20:55.1 (132nd), over a minute faster than her personal record last year.
The boys’ team performed extraordinarily as well. Frontrunner senior Sam Clark ran a personal best of 15:08.3, placing fourth individually out of 199 runners, shattering former star senior Kai Dettman’s record. In his first high school cross country race, junior Andrew Villapudua followed with a time of 15:37.8. Junior Benicio Perez, senior Ian Wang, and junior Andrew Parkinson also ran times of of 16:01.9 (48th), 16:23.4 (76th), and 16:26.9 (77th), respectively. Senior Earl Tizon also ran a personal best of 17:25.2 (160th), and senior Nick Owens pushed through an ankle injury, running a time of 17:58.5 (173rd).
“I anticipate good results throughout the whole season,” senior Ian Wang said. “We’re gonna be really strong.”
The team is set to run their first league meet on Thursday, Sept. 26.
