Girls win first meet,
Jacey wins it all
With a warm late summer sun shining from above, the Hamilton cross country team started its 2009 campaign. The harriers traveled to Briarcliff H.S. to run against the host team and Pleasantville.
The day started with the Hamilton team getting a walking tour of the challenging course. One look at the ‘mountain’ that is the heart of the Briarcliff course left the Hamilton team gasping. This was clearly going to be one hard afternoon. 2.95 miles later, there was no doubt left, this was one tough course.
The day belonged to the Hamilton Lady Raiders. The team was led by Jacey who won the girls’race. Her gutsy 23:36 performance, followed by efforts from Sydney, Dulce, Aiyana, Kathleen and Kazia combined to defeat Briarcliff earning the Hamilton girls’ XC program its first victory ever.
Though victory eluded the boys’ team today, there were some bright spots. Tre (21:25) and Joel (21:33) in their cross country debuts finished in the top ten. Well sort of… Joel should have finished in the top 10. Unfortunately, he took a right turn when he should have turned left and well you know… Allen picked up the #3 spot with a strong 22:40. Joji and Stephen closed off the Hamilton scoring at 24:01 and 24:03 respectively.
Special mention must be made of Alexis, Aiyana, James and Kazia, all of whom had one tough introduction to cross country. This has to be one of the toughest courses around. Still not one of them quit, and after all that’s what it’s all about.
****next week the squad travels to Somers, site of the October county championship.
