The Cook County boys’ and girls’ cross country team held its first (and only) meet on Thursday, September 1 on Pincushion Mountain Trails. Far left: Running strong for the boys was Nate Carlson and Will Seaton, who finished less than a second back of Carlson. Above: Sara Schield leads teammate Matea Acero to the finish line, finishing 2 seconds ahead of Matea. Mara MacDonell was the fifth girl in for the Vikings girl’s varsity team, placing 43rd overall.
Walking around the Pincushion Mountain Trails course Thursday morning, setting the course for our home cross-country meet, I was doing an “I hope it doesn’t rain” dance. I wish I hadn’t been so successful, as the clouds vanished and the temperatures quickly climbed into the 80s, not a good temperature for a long, tough race.
It was especially tough on our young team. Of last year’s team of 38, 10 graduated, six left the district, and two chose to do other things. New Head Coach April Wahlstrom had recruited some replacements, moved a bunch of young kids up to varsity, and had them prepared and motivated to race. It is still a little intimidating though, when Duluth East pulls up in two buses with over 100 kids on the team, to say nothing of Hibbing, Proctor, Mesabi East, South Ridge, Carlton and Wrenshall.
Audrey Summers, who had a good track season last spring, and who had trained consistently all summer, led our girls in the varsity race. She started in the top half of the girls’ field, moving up to 18th in the 60-girl field with a time of 19:29 for 2.5 miles. Not only did she improve by a minute from last year on a day when almost everyone was at least 30 seconds slower, she improved by 21 places.
About 45 seconds behind, junior Sara Schield, who also had a good summer of training, turned in a time similar to last year – and improved by 18 places, finishing 21st.
Eighth-grader Matea Acero, who started last year racing junior high but was our No. 4 runner by Section, kept Sara in sight, finishing just 2 seconds back.
Junior captain Sarissa Falk battled the heat and finished 36th in 21:56, while newcomer Emma Olfson, a freshman, had an outstanding race, finishing 38th in 22:12. Mara MacDonell rounded out the varsity girls’ team, running 23:36 in 43rd place.
Overall, the girls’ finished 4th in the team competition, a very good start to the season.
Our boys’ team was even more decimated by the turnover from last year, with only junior captain Ben Seaton and sophomore Joey Chmelik returning from last years’ varsity. They provided the leadership we needed, however, as Ben ran 20:33 for 3.1 miles to finish 17th in the 65-runner field, and Joey was 9 places back in 21:33.
Sophomore Drew Christensen was next for the Vikings, 39th in 23:26.
Then came the eighth- and ninth-grade guys, who all did a great job in their first varsity run. Nate Carlson was 50th in 25:43, Will Seaton 51st in 25:43.6, Sean MacDonell 54th in 26:00, and Everett Hommes 55th in 26:26.
The boys finished 5th of 8 in the team competition.
Alex Ditmanson led the Vikings in the JV race, finishing 25th in 18:53 for 2.5 miles. Owen Cruikshank was 29th in 20:05, Roman Schnobrich 30th in 20:43 in the 40 boys field. First-year runner Cailan Carpenter was our only girl in the JV race, running 28:26 in her first race ever.
We had a big group of girls in the junior high race, a number of whom will help us in varsity meets later in the season. Abby Seipke was 5th in 12:44 for the 1.6-mile race. Jasmine Swenson was 7th in 12:53, Lily Gruber-Schulz 11th in 13:50, Ruby Walsberg 12th a second back, and Julia Larsen 15th in 19:28. Andy Kern was the only young boy running for the Vikings, and he ran a nice first race of 17:33 in the boys’ race.
After a week off for the first week of school, the team will head over to Eveleth for the Golden Bear Invitational, where we will race against most of the teams in Section 7A.
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