Regionals at Allendale is a day of excitement, nerves, and more often than not, our fastest racing of the season. For many of us, it's our last opportunity of the season. A few of the girls took that opportunity and “ran with it.” Congratulations to senior Maggie Duba, junior Nathalie Strockis, and sophomore, Lily Lesarge on qualifying for State! For the whole varsity girls team, they were 4th place, and if a few things went our way, we were only 13 points away from all of us qualifying! That doesn’t take away from the girls because we still ran with our heart and our hardest effort!  Maggie wasn’t to be denied qualifying not only from doing it twice but her overall work and commitment to get there this year wasn’t going to let her throw it away at the end. Maggie hit a 19:48 season record and was 7th overall in the region! Way to show up and represent Maggie! Nathalie Strockis had a huge day, hitting a 20:54 PR, a minute faster than her last race, second for varsity and being in the top 20 (19th) for a state qualifying race! Nathalie didn’t let pressure of getting to state affect her psyche in the race. It was determination and focus to get there! Nice work Nathalie! Lily also qualified, 20th overall and 10 seconds away from Nathalie! Way to work together, girls! Abby Druelle hit a season record of 22 seconds with a 21:13! Claire Smith hit a ten second PR after getting one at the last conference race! She ran exactly a minute faster from the regional meet last year! Abby and Claire all season have kept it close with their teammates in the races to help us score well! Maggie McKeiver ran 22:12 and was only 6 seconds away from the PR she also hit at the last conference race! The majority of the team ran their best race of the year or came close to it! We were keen on our preparation this week, our legs were fresh. The pressure was on us, but we let our effort overtake any doubt we may have had going on. With only Maggie and Anna graduating, this group is well equipped to compete next year! Three at the State Finals is an awesome thing, but to have four more is the ultimate goal! What it shows is the team was well motivated all season and they accomplished the goal as one unit! If we prepare and train like we should, show up when it counts, like we did at Regionals, we’ll be in a good position to do just that! Good stuff this season varsity! 

For the Prom Race, Lainey Roth led the way with a season record, 22:01! Lainey wanted to build that confidence again, after not being satisfied with the last race. Lainey will be looking to her senior year to stay in the varsity and help her team win! Way to finish strong, Lainey! Audrey Mckeiver also had a strong finish to her season! She took almost a minute off her PR running a 23:22! Audrey has made good progress this year peeking in the last couple races! That’s what we want for all of us! Brenna Olewinski ran a 24:55 SR while Bree Hoffer who was right behind her was only 4 seconds away from a SR! Anna Richmond sought to end her high school cross country career n a good note! She hit a 26:52 season record and kept up with the competition so she could do that! Anna has brought positivity, and encouragement to the team that will surely be missed next year! Also Coach Duba competed in the prom with a time of 24:25 at the finish! Coach wanted to keep even splits and did so pretty well for having to coach and run on the same day! 

It was a solid season with the ups and downs it normally has! State finals are on November 6th, and the girls are going to have a great week of practice to kill it on Saturday!