How do you measure success in cross country? It’s a question that can’t be easily answered. A majority of sports, the score shows a clear “winner and loser.” You can obviously find the positives and negatives for how both teams played, but the score doesn’t lie. Cross country has team scores, individual scores, team times, individual times, placing, medals, personal records, ulterior motives, etc. It comes down to the spirit and attitude of the team and the culture that cross country brings. Cross country promotes positivity and finishing the race strong. Each team has their own measurement to what they feel is “success.” A team may have gotten last place, but each runner hit a personal best. A team may score in the top three as a team, but they didn’t run to their times or race strategy. A team can be eyeing for state or making sure all of their runners finish. It is a complex relationship between team success, individual goals and runners either having good or bad days. Some runners may fall ill, injured or mentally just out of sorts. Some kids who have been racing for more than 10 weeks find their groove and hit a PR. This complex relationship played out at the last conference race of the season at Holland Christian.

For us, West Catholic, we would say we had a successful day! Elisha Fedisoni who has been eyeing to break 20 for the whole season, did it in a big way with a 40 second PR! He ran a 19:40! Elisha stuck with the competitors and rather than trying to make it up after taking off too fast, preserved his effort the rest of the race! Nice racing Elisha! Jack VandeGuchte was the second varsity spot, he hit a season's best 20:39! Jack was sick at this portion of the season last year, so the team is glad he got to run the conference final and will at regionals this time! Evan Murphy was 3rd for varsity and 2 seconds from a PR, with a finish of 20:52! As a freshman, you must realize improvement comes in waves throughout your years. If a runner PR’d every race they are running a 12 minute 5k by the end of their career, so it’s part of development to run slower times. Evan felt this race was a confidence booster coming close to his best of the season. August Christensen (20:56) and Tim O’Brien (20:57) both hit more than minute PRs on the day too! The whole season, they are two people who know how to stick with teammates. Their best races have come from doing that! Charles Brooks was dealing with stomach pain and it clearly affected his race! Regardless, he still fought until the end, right by Caleb Huizienga who was determined to finish strong, even if it wasn't his fastest. Caleb has one more race to leave it on the course, and his teammates know the energy he brings to practice and meets will help him do that! Good stuff boys!

  It comes down to this week, leading to regionals on the 30th. For some of us, this is our last week to get that PR, hit those goals, and end with confidence. This week is about fueling the desire to compete well on Saturday. The work has been done, there's not a lot of practice we can do to prepare. It's about “controlling in between the ears” to show up in a big way. If some of us want to make it state, we must run for each other and know each place and time counts. Let's not tell ourselves after Saturday, "well I guess, I could have given more."