Finishing in a position nearly identical to that of last year’s season, Paly’s girls’ cross country team placed third in the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League championship meet at Crystal Springs on Tuesday, falling behind rivals Mountain View High School and Gunn High School.
“It was a good solid effort,” girls’ head coach Paul Jones said, “although we are missing a few runners from soccer injuries and sickness.”
Sophomore Gracie Cain, who has been improving consistently throughout the season, took the team by surprise by placing first for Paly in the varsity division at 19 minutes, 20 seconds.
“I feel pretty excited,” Cain said. “Jones told us that we had three runners under the twenty-minute mark, which is really exciting for the team.”
Following Cain was junior Kathleen Higgins, who came in at 19:37, senior Elizabeth Scott at 19:48, senior Gillian Lui at 20:06, senior Sarah Haydock at 20:25, junior Regina Wang at 20:31, and sophomore Erin Kiekhaefer at 21:46.
Another notable performance came from Haydock, who improved more than a minute and a half over her previous race at Crystal Springs.
“I knew it was my last race at Crystal Springs as a senior, so I knew I had to go in staying very focused,” Haydock said.
Due to the stormy weather before the race, the course was considerably windy and chilly for the runners.
“I was worried about the wind and rain condition before the race, but it wasn’t much of a problem when I ran [the course],” Higgins said.
The top five teams from the league meet will advance to the Central Coast Selection championships. Paly will enter CCS in the Division II section, which is the most competitive division in CCS, according to Jones. According to the San Jose Mercury News, more than half of the top 15 teams in CCS are from the Division II section. Since only the top three teams of each division will head to states, Paly will have to compete at its best.
“We are one of the top five to six teams fighting for a slot to states,” Jones said.
Last year, the girls fell short to advance to states as a team. The top five individuals of the top 14 teams in CCS will advance to states. Jones thinks that Cain, Scott, and Higgins all have the potential to claim individual spots for states.
With only a little more than a week left until CCS, the team needs to restore the sick and injured, finalize the varsity team selection, and improve race strategies.
“Jones suggested that we find a partner during the race so that we could draft off each other on the curves,” Higgins said. “We could have done better on that.”
According to Jones, there are currently twelve potential runners for the seven spots on Paly’s varsity team. They will all train for CCS and will be selected by Jones on the day of the race.
“We are on a roll here,” Haydock said. “We need to train smart to do well at CCS. We have a lot of potential.”
CCS championships will be held on Saturday, Nov. 15, at Toro Regional Park in Monterey.