Part One (Dom Camasso) - Part Two (Brian Quintrell) - Part Three (Brad Miles) - Part Four (Tim Stauring)
The North Penn 2008 Cross-Country Season
Brad Miles (junior)
Summer-
I came back slow this summer because of my stress fracture that I got in my shin right as spring track started. Our team met every morning and did long runs, a little speed. Since I was coming back slowly, my high mileage was around 40.
Goals- From the first get together in the summer, our main goal was focused on states. However, we probably focused too much on the state meet without worrying on the early invitationals. Last year we were successful because we took every meet, meet for meet unlike the early stages of this year. But again, our main goal was repeating at states. We really didn’t think about Nationals until after states.
Early Season-
CB East Invite- The team won with a score of 24 points. I individually won also that day. Very humid and warm.
Briarwood Invite- First time we realized we needed to start focusing on each meet a little more. Very tough day, myself and a few other guys didn’t run well, but this meet is where Sam Bernitt really came out and attacked the course. We came in second behind West Windsor Prep by 1 point.
Carlisle- Best meet of the season for us mentally and probably the most important meet of the season for us.. This meet refocused us on this season and probably was a main reason we won states. I came in 2nd behind Kyle Hurston and our team came in 2nd behind North Alleghany who really ran incredible that day. If we won this race, we probably would have kept going on how we were this season. But, we really buckled down and focused on every practice and meet.
Salesianum- First meet that showed that we really refocused as a team. The team won by 26 points, and I won with a time of 16:20 to place third on the all time list behind Shariff Karie and Alan Webb. Very important team meet, and my best race of the season.
Manhattan- We ran in the Varsity B race, and ran it like a dual meet. Team placed 1-4 and ran unpushed. We had the second fastest team average of the day behind Jamestown.
Leagues- Team won easily, and I individually won in a 15:38. Felt great and did not feel pushed at all. After the race I had I was really looking forward to Districts.
Districts- The day after leagues I had a throat problem and felt very weak all week. However, our team was feeling stronger than ever and feeling very confident coming into the race. The team won, and I came in 6th individually in 15:30. Very upset with this race because I went 15:24 my sophomore year.
States- Coming into states, I did not feel much better physically from districts. But, the team was still feeling very strong and our spread was the closest of all season. We came in ranked behind NA which was good for us because it took a lot of pressure off of us and it is always great being the underdog. We won the state title again and all of our guys ran incredibly. I came in 7th in 16:30. Not what I was imagining coming into this season, but I still have one more year. Team decided to run Regionals.
Leading up to Nationals-
Week one- After states I took 4 days off because I wasn’t feeling the best. In the end it turned out to be a smart decision because my legs started feeling strong again. The rest of the week was just focusing on nice easy long runs.
Week two- Ran three hard workouts with long runs in between them. Felt great personally, but the team wasn’t looking to good. Sam, Dom, and Nick felt like they were getting injured so they took the week and the rest of the month leading up to regionals easy. Probably wasn’t the best going into the regional meet but they were smart and prevented getting injured any farther.
Week three- Ran 2 hard workouts and felt pretty good. Team still not feeling the best but we kept our hopes high. That Saturday I ran in the Turkey Trot in Towamencin and came in first with a 15:35. Feeling very good heading into regionals.
Week four- Very light training this week, one hard workout on Tuesday with long runs the rest of the week. Began the journey up to New York on Friday morning.
The Meet-
Ran at 10:50 in the morning. A little warmer than last year with highs around 40. Individually I didn’t go out as hard as last year to hopefully conserve more for the hill. Felt pretty strong and came in 6th overall in a 16:20. My team said that they didn’t feel good at all and it was not looking good for making it to Portland. This meet is tough because it is hard having 5 guys run very strong a month after the state meet (which we were peaking for). However, I fortunately was able to make it to Portland as an individual.
Week of Nationals-
Easy training all week with a tempo run on Tuesday, but other than that I ran easy long runs the rest of the week. Arrived in Oregon on Thursday.
NXN- I could write an entire novel on how amazing this weekend was, but for you I will keep it short. Thursday night we got checked into the hotel, got our shoes fitted, and had an amazing dinner and opening ceremonies. The worst part of the weekend was getting used to the time change. Thursday night’s dinner at 8 o’clock felt like way past my bedtime. Got back to the hotel at 9:30 Pacific time and crashed immediately. Friday we went to the course and then went back to Nike Headquarters and had a question and answer time for 4 hours with all the elite runners. This was the perfect time to get a lot of autographs. Now fast forwarding to Saturday morning… the weather was the best ever in the history of the meet, and it showed with 2 course records being broken by 30 seconds on the male and female sides. The course wasn’t my favorite due to how flat it was, the hay bails, and the woopdidoos, but the experience was incredible. I ended up coming in 54th overall. Not exactly what I was predicting but the experience was well worth it and will be remembered forever. Saturday night was amazing, the lounge at the Nike headquarters was a great time to get to know all the other runners and a great time to get to know the other Northeast individuals. Above all else, that dinner was incredible. Kara Goucher (Adam Goucher’s wife) ate dinner with us for an hour and just told us her whole life story and just talked to us like we were her lifelong friends. And the one thing I took away from entire talk with her was ALWAYS BELIEVE. The closing ceremonies were very good, the dance was another great opportunity to meet the runners from around the country, and that night’s sleep was terrible. I went to bed at 12:45 and woke up at 3 for the plane flight back to PA. NXN was the most incredible weekend of my life and will definitely be one of the most memorable. Nike treated every runner like a king and I want to thank them for everything.
Other thanks go out to my entire team, family, team parents, and coaches. Seniors thank you for your leadership and everything you have done to make this season incredible and running your hearts out every race. Family and team parents, thank you for always supporting me and the team. Everything you do does not go unnoticed and we appreciate everything. Coaches, thanks for putting in the time and effort in training us all season. Coach Jaros, you will be missed greatly next season, but thank you so much and you definitely deserve coach of the year. And I also want to thank the Lord for keeping me and my team healthy this season. I just want to give You all the glory this season and every race in the future.
Brian Quintrell (senior)
Summer Training
Coming into the summer I think we as a team were very confident and expectations were high. We knew what we had to do during the summer from the year before and we did that. Coach Jaros gave us a packet of what to do each week at our XC meeting before school ended and I think we started training the first day of summer vacation. We met every morning at the high school during the summer for our runs and workouts. A big component of the summer was “recruiting” Sam to XC. I don’t think anyone knew how much we would need him in the end.
CB East Invite
I personally really like this meet because it is a flat course early in the year against good local teams and you really get to see where you are coming into the season. The day of the race came and it was humid, rainy and just a nasty day to be running. Most of our times were slower than what we ran last year but we still had a low score and we knew we had a good team. I knew we had a chance to have a special season after the race when right after I finished I looked behind me and saw Sam about two seconds behind me.
Briarwood
Briarwood was our first big test at an invitational against great teams from Pennsylvania and New Jersey. We knew who we were looking for in the race and really wanted to run well. It turns out the team we didn’t know is the team we should have been looking out for. West Windsor Plainsboro North from NJ which I did not even know of until after our cool down when we found out that we lost 68-69. The brightest point of this race was Sam because he ran a best time of 50 seconds on a hard course and was our second man. During the summer all he complained about was running hills so to do that on a hilly course is something special.
Carlisle
Carlisle is a meet in the middle of the season where teams from all over the state come and compete as perhaps a pre-state meet. All the best teams in the state were there and we wanted to make a statement and prove that even though we lost two of our top runners from last year we could still compete with the best teams.
The course was very sloppy and within the first mile Tim went down in a pile up and hurt his back. That hurt us because you cannot expect to beat the best teams in the state without one of your top five guys. Overall the race just wasn’t a good day for us and North Allegheny straight up beat us. Even with all the disappointment of the meet I think it was good for us because we realized that we were not as good as we thought and I think that woke us up.
Salesianum
This meet we really wanted to just come in and get a win. We had a couple bad breaks and tough races and really just wanted to get back onto a winning note. We did just that and just about everyone had a great race. Our race was the last race of the day at 4:45 and after getting there much earlier we really just wanted to run. To pass the time we sat at the top of the biggest hill coming out of the woods and watched the other races climb the hill. For people that don’t know the course at Salesianum the course is a beast and the hill I am talking about is about 1.5 miles into the race and very painful. So we sat at the top just watching all the people that raced before us climb that hill. We ended up scoring 34 points and had great races from everyone. I was ecstatic with my race because I dropped over 35 seconds from my race last year. This course I think does a great job at getting us mentally and physically ready for the state course.
Manhattan
I don’t know what we do for our training the week before Manhattan or if the course is perfect for us as a team because the last two years we have run great. Coach Jaros did not enter us into the championship race because we had three very important weeks coming up and we could still compare our times to teams and individuals from that race. We were happy with our race and Manhattan is an awesome meet with teams from all over country. My race went well; I got out well and was right where I wanted to be entering the woods. By the bridge I was in third or fourth place with Brad well ahead of everyone and Dom and Tim right with me. Coming back across the bridge I was in third behind Tim and Brad. In the final straight away I passed Tim but at that point it really did not matter because we ended up getting 1,2,3,4,9 and had the second fastest average of the day.
On a side note Manhattan is where Alex really came out of his shell; he was on varsity the entire year but never really talked or said much, until this meet. Before our race we went to hang out in the woods and relax and we brought the stereo to listen to some techno like we do before every race. Little did we know that a little techno would make Alex go crazy and after that we could never get him to be quiet the rest of the year. Whether he knows it or not he really made the season fun by cracking jokes and allowing us to relax before big races.
SOL League Meet
The league meet is an interesting meet because some of the teams you may have just run against and some of the teams you haven’t seen since mid September. Since the meet is at Lehigh you come into the race hoping to run fast and we wanted to score as low a score as possible. We ended up scoring 28 points and captured the SOL Continental Conference championship. I was happy with my time and effort because I ran one second slower than last year at districts and I knew I had more in the tank for districts this year.
District 1
We were confident in ourselves and in each other and that Coach Jaros and Coach Perilli had us ready to do what we had to do. And after a pasta party and some new haircuts we were ready to run. We really wanted to win but in the back of your head you know you just have to be one of the top 5 teams to get to states.
The race went out in about 4:55 for the first mile which I was happy about because I don’t like to go out crazy so the race was set up perfectly for me. The second mile some of the leaders took off and the pack really strung out. I constantly heard people yelling places around 15 or so up to the two mile. The entire last mile at Lehigh is downhill so you got to really fly. I was catching up to the next pack but ran out of time but I was really happy with an 11th place finish and a new PR. We came in and did what we had to do and finished first which was a real confidence boaster since District One has done so well at states the last couple years.
States
Coming into the state meet we were confident with where we were and our training. We were happy to be the underdogs and let NA take the favorite role; after all they deserved it for the way they beat up on everyone at Carlisle. I was not nervous at all just really excited. That’s what I remember most about that morning, last year I remember I could barely eat breakfast but this year I was ready. We got to the course and did a shake down and I was feeling ready to go. The race was similar to districts were I went out relaxed and was feeling good at the mile. After that first mile the course is a monster but I was ready this year for the hills and really worked up them. The last mile was without a doubt one of the most painful moments of my life. I was hurting so bad but I knew I had to keep going and mentally stay focused. The second and third miles I heard people yelling that I was around 30th place which was a good spot because a personal goal of mine was to grab an individual medal. Going up the last hill with 400 meters I was hurting. The hill was so much longer than I remembered from the course walk the day before but I knew once I was up it I would be done. After I finished I was unsure of my place and I have no idea where any of my teammates were. I did not see anyone after the first mile which made me a little nervous because the whole race I was just behind two guys from North Allegheny. After I found the guys and got changed we cooled down and we went to the results trailer and waited for about five minutes until we heard the news that we had won!! All the hard work had paid off. We were state champions again. The feeling is the best in the world. I think the way we did it this year made it that much sweeter because we didn’t go undefeated and we were not the favorites. After all the long runs and workouts on the hot days and all the days where you can barely walk at school the next day it was all worth it at that moment. After looking at the scores and our places our coaches were telling us that they thought this year’s team may have been even better than last year’s which was crazy to think about. Also it was great to win back to back state championships for Coach Jaros because this was his last year coaching and he puts so much time and effort into coaching us to help us be the best we can be.
In the following days after states we decided that we wanted to give the NTN regional meet another try because after falling just short last year we really wanted to go out to Oregon. The four weeks in between states and Regionals went okay. My training was going well but Kuntzmann’s foot was hurting and Sam’s knee was really bad. During that time it got pretty cold here and it rained a lot which really made it hard to try and stay on the soft surfaces. In the break from States to Regionals we were really just trying to hold on for dear life and make it to Regionals healthy and run our best. It reminded me very much like last year at the State meet when we barely won states and I think we peaked a little early. This year we peaked 100% for states which is what we wanted and then depending on how we did at states we were going to decide on NTN.
Why we chose North Wales Running Club
We had decided to run as North Wales Running Club because Scott Tantino who went to North Penn owns a running store called North Wales Running Company and he had singlets all made. Scott was a great mentor for me but also the entire team. When you have a question about anything running or a question about why you have felt so tired or your legs feel so bad, he’s got the answer and he’s just a great guy to look up to.
NTN Regional Meet
We were so excited for this meet and when it was finally here we were ready. We went up the night before and stayed in a hotel and did almost everything the same as the night before states including going to the same restaurant, ordering the same food and watching the same movie before. But even with all this our race was just the opposite of our race at states. Brad and Tim ran well but other than that nobody had it. I remember going through the mile and hearing someone yell 5:20 and feeling just dead. I don’t know why that happened or what happened to me but I just was drained. When I finished I was the fourth man but ran slower than I did last year. Overall it was just a day to forget. Although we ran so poorly I do not for a second regret choosing to run there. I got to spent another month with my seven best friends and have memories I will never forget from this season. The season did not end how we wanted but I could not have imagined winning back to back state championships when I came out for XC as a sophomore. I look back on the 2008 cross country season with nothing but a smile on my face.
*If anyone found two North Penn Cross Country Sweatshirts at the State Meet and would like to return them to Alex and me that would be great.*
Dom Camasso (senior)
From day one I felt back at home when I showed up to our first summer get-together. One thing I noticed over the past two years is how much of a family NPXC is and its “unique” traditions, which I feel made us a very successful team. The one special thing is that the graduates come back to run with us in the summer and help us get back into shape. One tradition we have is to go for runs with Scott Tantino, who owns North Wales Running Company, who helps us out in our training.
Also I would go workout on my own time with Jay Jameson, who runs basketball clinics, who has also inspired me throughout the summer and into the season with his unparalleled quotes and motivational speeches. I would be telling people in school how I have run all summer with the team and to them it’s a punishment, but to me this cross country team was one of my favorite high school memories. Especially my time with Zack Montijo, he is probably one of the biggest idols in my life and I couldn’t thank him enough for what he taught me. Every race I ran alongside of him was somehow special in different ways.
Which is also great about our team, we always have different traditions for every meet. Such as when we are pulling up to Lehigh University for a race we always play the Darth Vader theme song. Also, after our race at Salesianum we would go for a swim in the river. I would have never thought sophomore year I would end up where I am now. That’s all thanks to my team and the two Zacks that graduated last year. This is definitely a unique sport where not only a team but the whole sport itself is very close to one another.
Our season starts in June where we build our base down and up our miles from track. At this time we get to look ahead to the season and try to figure out what it takes for us to be successful. Basically we just take it easy and catch up on things. We usually just would go out on a couple of runs often and hang out on weekends.
As we come into the season training in September with our coach, Ron Jaros and Ernest Perilli (who are the best coaches ANY runner could possibly have), we come in with ample enthusiasm and confidence to work through their crazy workouts. No matter how hard the workout is they somehow find a way to make it “fun”.
As our season began it was funny to see how we were once again underestimated. So again, we had to come out in the early meets and prove ourselves at the Central Bucks East Inv. and earlier league meets. At the beginning of the season I personally felt it just wasn’t the same without the two Zacks there with us. I didn’t have the same comfort level at the meets without them there, they were definitely a major impact to us to relax before a race and get us fired up. But as we ran at more races we found a way to provide that to ourselves.
I think the time up to the Carlisle Invitational we became a little too overconfident in ourselves and it showed as we saw the results of our race. We came in 2nd to the North Alleghany team. Our ride home from Carlisle was the quietest ride home from a race we ever had in the past two years. That was probably the lowest any of us ever felt from a XC race. However the next day we came in and Coach Jaros gave us a talk I would never forget. He explained to us how we needed to get our focus and mindset we had last year. Not only that but it shows there are other teams out there that are better, and the only way to be better is to work.
After that day I realized how I should be thanking North Alleghany for beating us cause if we didn’t get beat that day, it could have been at states instead. We finally felt what it was like to lose a race like that and went back to our underdog mindset again. We got back onto our winning record again but kept our heads level.
One of the hardest weeks of our season was the week of Salesianum. We worked hills for that week and the week previous and were hell because hills are my one weakness. But I just made myself remember whatever pain I put in at practice is that much less I would need to feel during my race. We showed up to the meet that day full with such fire and confidence that nobody could have stopped us that day. I will always remember what Zack Montijo told me before my race the previous year, “Dom, when you’re climbing those hills just look down at your jersey…and remember who you’re running for…all the guys who you’re representing…and tell yourself I’m running for NPXC, time to conquer this hill. ”. So for every hill on that course I just remember that and pushed it as hard as my body could go. We came out on top that race and went home happy. After that day I started to begin to look back on everything I had done and accomplished with my team and how the season was coming to an end.
Our next race was at the Manhattan Invitational where I came into a little too over confident because it was a short race and somewhat flat. We came into the race just to run our own races and not try to go against the best just yet. So we competed in one of the other varsity races. We just stayed in the woods throughout the day and listened to some of our favorite techno songs which included a “Barbie Girl” techno remix that people nearby seemed to like.
Once the race started I got a little too excited and followed Brad Miles and felt pretty solid. As the race continued I eventually died at the last 1k and lost contact with Brad and soon my other teammates. I was pretty down on myself after the race and lost confidence in myself for a while. I was surprised when it turned out we had the fastest overall time of the day because we ran our race as it was another league meet race.
From Manhattan to leagues we basically continued to do what we did all season… nothing different in practice. So now we were training for my favorite course, Lehigh, which was the flattest course we raced on all year. We made sure we kept up our normal routine and didn’t change anything up. It felt like just another race to me. We came out, competed, and walked away with the trophy.
The next week however at Districts was pretty special. I remember how cold and foggy it was but somehow we made the best of it and had fun. All I remember is all of us (20 guys) under one blanket and make a scene of ourselves. It felt just like the old times. But what really brought our spirits up that day was when during our shake down run one of our runners (Jon Kim) “airplaned” the team in front of us, with his big headphones and a big robe on. I really then realized that this would be the last race for some of my teammates and that even they wanted to make the best of it and really show what a NPXC runner is made of in their race.
So us varsity runners seen them go at it in their race and took on the same mindset for ourselves. Of course, I got too fired up and led the race for the first mile and was in the top ten at the second mile but by the last Ik felt the pain. It was the dumbest thing I had done all season in a race but personally it was worth it because the other guys got a good laugh seeing it and it was a fun experience.
However the real test finally came in the next week. Finally we were on our way to states.” It was déjà-vu for me as we got into our two vans and headed up to Hershey. We had our fun by going to Chocolate World and watching Step Brothers (which we must have watched 5+ times in the two days we were there) in our hotel rooms. The next day (Race Day) I remember waking up to Jay Jameson texting me a picture of a puma and telling me “Run like the puma Dom, get hungry and go for it”.
We came out knowing we would all have to stay within ourselves and just run the same race we had been doing all year. Just like the year before my mind was racing with thoughts and things people told me about the course and race. We were pretty quiet throughout warm up and even on the start line we stayed within ourselves but still maintained our silent confidence.
Before every race I always try to find something to motivate me. On the start line I just kept going through all the people who believed in me and trained me to my potential, My Dad, Coach Jones, Coach Jaros & Perilli, Jay Jameson, Scott Tantino, Sean Lawlor, etc. Then when we got in a circle to get fired up one quote came to mind, “You gotta open your heart and let that hate out” which I heard from Zack Montijo. After we broke off and ran back to the start line I knew today was our day. I even brought a picture of Zack and I had it in my shoe sole for good luck and to remember we gotta do it for them.
The race was a blur to me. All I remember is telling myself “everything I put into this day, all those long hard days, gotta open my heart and let that hate out and we gotta win this”. When I finished I didn’t think I would be able to run another day after the pain my body was feeling from that course.
When they finally made the announcement that we won states it felt like it was all a dream, I couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t describe how I felt let alone my teammates, it was amazing! However after a little bit of celebrating we calmed down and kept our cool and tried to act like we did it before (which we did) when we got our medals. We went to Cracker Barrel for dinner, which was another tradition of ours. That was the high of our season.
From there it went downhill with injuries and missing practice days for everyone on the team. Somehow everyone either got sick or hurt after states, which then showed when we had a poor performance at regionals’. Yet personally, I wasn’t as upset because I would have rather won states then winning Regionals just because states is so much more important to us because Regionals was just a optional race that we took on as a fun race.
So I don’t think we were as upset from losing at Regionals. The night I got back from Regionals I finally got to look back on my past two years of XC. I looked back on when I was a basketball player and how my life was so depressing and how the guys brought me out to XC instead the next year. I thought of all the long runs we had together and all the fun times we went out as a team to the movies and such. I’ll never forget all the stories Scott Tantino & Coach Jaros told us about the days back in the day.
Also I will never forget when I came back from states in ’07 and Jay Jameson wore my state medal around the gym showing off as if we won it himself. I would also like to give a special thanks to Zack Montijo for showing me what it took to become champion and giving me the knowledge your upperclassmen gave you. I can’t even show how happy and grateful I am to have spent my time with all my teammates this two years and all the amazing memories we had together.
NPXC really is the best memory I had so far in my life. One thing about us is that we will always have a special bond even when we leave for college and move on with our lives we will always come back and help out the upcoming NPXC guys and show them the ways and traditions on how to have fun while winning championships. ~NPXC 4 Life~ never forget…
-Dom Camasso
Tim Stauring (senior)
Summer training: Starting practice the day after school ended had a bittersweet feeling. Getting up early and running sounded like hell, personally. I am sure it did to many others on the team as well. Regardless that it was early and the first day of summer vacation, we had an “okay” turnout. We actually had Zach Montijo and Zach Hoagland come out and join us to do their college training.
It was interesting the first few weeks. I began to notice who was dedicated to the team, who came when they could, and who could really care less. This was seen a lot during the replacement of our sixth and seventh person on the varsity team. (Laughing) It was rather tough to get Sam Bernitt out to run. He was really into soccer at the time. Since he had so many friends on the soccer team, getting him to come out for cross country was a challenge. Nevertheless, all those nagging phone calls proved successful.
The seventh man decision was actually a topic on which we used to make bets on (without actually using money). Some people thought of Brandon Rothenberger or Mike Wesolowski. Others considered Mike Duggan or maybe even Shane Kasey. But no one, least of all me, expected, the man himself, Alex Dello Bueno to step up. He really didn’t become a top runner until later on in the season. Others alternated positions, then Alex finally clinched it about three meets into our season.
With our top pack shaping up, summer runs became more and more serious. Very few of our runs consisted of actual workouts such as thousands, repeats, or time intervals. We built our base core training by doing long runs. They ranged from one hour to ninety minutes through the amazing North Wales Nature Preserve. Some days, as we closed in on the beginning of the season, we did hill workouts.
A little side note about Sam Bernitt, (a.k.a. Bambi). He hated hills. Whether he was at Briarwood in Philadelphia, or in Manhattan, NY, or even the state course, “Bambi” would have the most classic look on his face whenever we encountered a hill. It was almost like he was saying “There are no hills in soccer!”
I’ll get back to the subject of our summer training. We would start our runs at North Wales Running Company, owned by Scott Tantino (go buy stuff there!) and would go onto multiple trails that we had traveled through numerous times. That was basically how our summer went. Long runs and, near the end, some long hard repetitions. Overall, we established a strong core and base.
Personal and team goal setting: It is very difficult to say what our team aimed towards in the beginning of this season. I mean, of course, we wanted to obtain a repeat state champions title. But I think that our team built a confidence level that we’d never had before during the summer. We were coming off of spring track. Getting back into our favorite sport in which, last year, we had been the best team in Pennsylvania. I think that confidence turned over into determination. In that, if we wanted to reach that goal again we were going to have to work even harder. Because, as Jim Church had told us, this year we will have “targets” on our backs. Personally, I had a goal of becoming second man on the team. I had been third at NTN Regionals last year and since Montijo had graduated, I figured second would be where I should place. I wanted to be there, I knew I could be, too.
The early season; ups and downs: In the beginning of the season, I realized that there was some doubt that had entered our racing mentality. We would toe the line in confidence and humbleness, but for the first couple of invitationals we still weren’t quite sure if we’d come out on top. Brian Quintrell noticed this as well. “I think I’m tired of just getting second place” he would yell at our pre-race huddle. Briarwood really hit home for our team. We lost by a matter of one point to the West Windsor Plains team from New Jersey. This was a wake up call for all of us. Carlisle was our turning point. I say this because afterwards we realized where our position as a team actually stood. North Allegheny has been our top PA competition for almost two years. They had a great race at Carlisle. However we, especially me, did not race very well. I suffered an injury after the first mile and did not finish where I should have. After we regained our composure, we entered the next couple of meets knowing we had to pace ourselves.
Midseason: Salesianum was a tough course. It was just flat out terrible. But for some odd reason, that was the type of course on which the North Penn cross country team raced well. Coach Jaros conditioned us for those types of races, ones that had long hills and short flats. I think that the Salesianum meet was where we regained our racing confidence. Even though at Manhattan we were not in the stacked race, we knew that we could finish it on top. I really tried to push it in that race. Since it was a 4000m course, it was easier to keep that first mile pace that most 5K courses demanded. We ran rather well and placed five of our varsity runners in the top nine.
Leagues: Leagues was always a blur for me. We showed up and raced teams that we had already seen during the year. So I really didn’t stress about it too much.
Districts: District I was difficult to be in. The five teams that qualified from districts to go on to states, usually ended up being in the top seventh or eighth place at states. So the district meet was really a pre-states race for North Penn.
Regionals: It is really frustrating for PA teams to compete in Nike Cross Nationals. This is because of the long time span in between States and Regional races. So when it came to the qualifying race for nationals, we were not peaking, and did not have our best races. For some odd reason I always seem to compete well on Regionals, so it was rather disappointing for me to see the team come that far and not qualify.
But overall, we are a very tight knit team that operates like a family. The junior varsity guys are no exception, and without any exceptions, those are the guys that make up the bread and butter (as our coach says) of our crew. I know that I speak for the entire team when I say that we will not only stay in contact with the entirety of our XC team, but also we will keep in touch with our superb coaching staff. Thanks a bunch to Ron Jaros and Ernest Perilli and good luck in the future!