Youth XC team practice (for members continuing on into Junior Olympic competition) will be held Monday through Thursday from 5:45 to 6:30 at the track. We will be turning the lights on in the stadium.

Since there is no meet next Sunday October 30, there will also be a practice that afternoon at 4:00.

Looking ahead: There will be no practice next Monday, October 31. (HAPPY HALLOWEEN!) Tuesday through Thursday practice will be from 6:00 to 6:45 at the track. The MA Middle School Championships are on Saturday, November 5, and the Amherst XC Invitational is on Sunday, November 6. The USATF New England Junior Olympic Championships are on Sunday November 13.

This week’s (and next week’s) open team practice schedule is as follows:

• Tuesday at 5:00 at the track
• Thursday at 5:00 at the track
• Sunday at 4:00 at the track

The Close Finish in the 11-12 Boy's Race
(Photo by Stephen Kraffmiller)

What an absolutely fabulous effort we saw today at the Mayor’s Cup! WTC members set 32 personal records, had 12 top 10 finishes (two members came in first), and captured 3 team titles and one second and one third team place! It was apparent that our previous exposure to the race course was a huge advantage for most of our members, as they had a much better feel for the course and the speed of the race. We also had triple the number of participants of any other club.

The 11-12 boys put 4 in the top 8; 11-2 girls had 4 in the top 6 and the 13-14 girls had 3 in the top 6.

The competition was rather fierce in all divisions, but especially so in the 11-12 races, which had extremely large boy’s and girl’s fields. The 11-12 boy’s race had, in Coach Joe’s words, “one of the closest and most exciting finishes that I have ever witnessed.” It was a three-way battle the entire final 200. With 5 meters to go, Daniel O’Donoghue was a stride or so behind in 3rd place and it appeared that he would be unable to catch the 2 boys in front of him. But just as we always emphasize—to drive through the finish and keep going another 10 meters—Daniel did just so, while the other 2 boys tied up and slowed a bit just before the finish line and Daniel nipped both of them right at the line. All 3 boys were given the same time, but Daniel was clearly ahead at the wire. We’ll be talking about that one for a while!

Congrats also to Kaitlyn McCauley who ran a PR 20:18 in the Open 5K race; she was 8th overall and the first for 18 and under’s. Her experience will hopefully help her in the upcoming state championships, which will be run on the same course.

Mayor’s Cup Results

Note: times in parentheses are members’ previous best times.

8-10 BOYS (3D PLACE TEAM)

8-10 GIRLS

11-12 BOYS (1ST PLACE TEAM)

11-12 GIRLS (1ST PLACE TEAM)

13-14 BOYS (2ND PLACE TEAM)

13-14 GIRLS (1ST PLACE TEAM)

Full results may be found here.

Congratulations to WTC members who competed at the Carlisle Middle School Invitational yesterday. Leah Brams won the varsity girls race with a PR time of 12:20 (which Joe believes is a meet record) and helped to lead her Belmont team to a 2nd place finish. (Leah finished 4th in this race last year with a time of 12:53). Clare Martin was 6th in 12:53 and Alex Wolf was 16th in 13:26. In the boy’s race, Christian Herlihy was 4th, (with a huge PR time of 11:29 over last year’s 12:45), Zachary Manickus-Hill was 7th, Daniel & Michael O’Donoghue were 9th & 10th and Thomas O’Donoghue was 19th. Christian, Daniel, Michael & Thomas led their team to a 1st place finish.

Complete results can be found here.

Youth XC team practice will be held Monday through Thursday at 5:45 at the track.

This Sunday is the Mayor’s Cup. Please have entry forms to Joe by this Thursday.

This week’s open team practice schedule is as follows:

• Tuesday at 5:30 at the track
• Thursday at 5:30 at the track
• Sunday at 4:00 at the track

Despite more challenging course conditions at Franklin Park today (many muddy areas which made the course a bit slower than for our first race a few weeks ago) we still had 8 members make personal records and many, many others that were only seconds off.

Today’s Franklin Park Results

CALVIN PERKINS 6:45
GABBY VANDENDRIES 7:05
HENDERSON SYKES 7:10 PR
EINAT GAVISH 7:15
CONNOR MEANEY 7:32
CHARLOTTE SYKES 7:37
LINDSEY MOGAN 7:45
LILLIAN JOYCE 7:46
OWEN PICKETTE 8:02
ROBERT MOUNTAIN 8:02 PR
SEAN O’NEIL 8:04
JACK CRONIN 8:05
KATIE CRONIN 8:06
PHILIP BATLER 8:16
GRIFFIN STEELE 8:37
THADDEUS DUFRESNE 8:38
JULIA KENDALL 8:3
SHEA BRAMS 8:51
ISABEL JOYCE 9:04
VICTORIA DEFABRITIIS 9:30 PR
MICHAEL CARPENITO-KRONENFIELD 9:38
AVA MADDEN 9:39
ROSE JOYCE 9:47
ALESSIA CAIRA 9:47
ANNA KRAFFMILLER 9:52 PR
HANNAH RANDOLPH 9:57
JACK ARAUJO 10:20
GEROME LUSSIER 10:39
WILL ARAUJO 12:34 PR
ALEXANDRA DEFABRITIIS 13:45 PR
GABRIELLA DEFABRITIIS 13:58 PR
CATARINA HAMEL SELLMAN 14:16 PR

Complete results may be found here (scroll down for youth race).