This fall, the cross-country team is hitting the ground running. Since June, the team has been hard at work to prepare for the fall season, practicing nearly every day. In recent weeks, the cross-country team’s workouts have been especially intense because of the extreme heat.
When asked what summer training looked like, junior Jones Naliboff said, “For those of us who were there for the entire summer pre-season, from late June to July 24th, [the training] has helped a lot. One of the ways that cross-country works is that mileage for the week increases by 10% every week. This means if you ran a total of 30 miles last week, you will run 33 miles this week. Because cross-country functions this way, it is super advantageous to get an early start on the season.”
Poly’s preseason training was put to the test during the Mountie Xpress Invitational on Saturday, Aug. 22nd, which organizes races by grade level instead of by into varsity and junior varsity divisions. The group’s juniors struggled the most, just barely missing the top 80 in both girls and boys divisions. However, two Panthers medaled: freshman Ella O’Byrne came in 30th place in her race with a time of 15:52 and senior Elizabeth Rweyemamu came in 27th place, ending with a time of 14:38. The invitational has a two mile course instead of the standard cross country three mile length, making it a good race for new runners. The team tackled their second race on Saturday, Sept. 12 at the Rosemead Invitational. Because the race is run in the evening, when temperatures are cooler, on a relatively flat course, many runners set personal records at Rosemead. Junior Kylie Cameron gave a standout performance, running a time of 18:48 for the three mile course and earning a medal for her 17th place finish.
Looking at the bigger picture for this season, the team has a ton of aspirations. Head coach Farid Hernandez hopes to see both teams qualify for CIF.
“We’re hoping to advance to finals as a [girls] team and maybe make it into state, which is something that I think Poly has never done before as a team. So it would be a pretty good accomplishment for us. And then on the boys side, the biggest, I would say, accomplishment for the boys would be to qualify for CIF Prelims, although it’s very difficult because they need to take the number two spot.”
The Poly Cross Country team sees a new horizon in their upcoming events. They have three more invitationals this season before the Prep League Finals and CIF SS Prelims. With their tools and coordination, the team has the potential to construct their future, one stride at a time.
