Caledonia once again inserted their dominance against the field of seven teams today, and a strong Kalamazoo Central team brought enough heat to earn second. I was hoping we would take second, but holding off the second half of the teams for third is still respectable. Furthermore, our girls gave what they had on the day, so I can’t ask for more.. 

Today was a day to test ourselves in new ways, to play around with personal race strategies, and a day to work hard. It was not a day to full-on go to the well, and I believe that in general, our girls showed up pretty darn strong.

We had freshman Ava Crews once again leading the charge and again running in the low 20s, and only six seconds away from winning the whole meet! Two of our team leaders, senior Jessica Durkee and junior Emelia MacDonald followed not too far behind, with Emelia earning a season record on the day.

Not feeling quite their best, but still pounding it out were junior Lindsey Velting and sophomore Holly Velting. Next, rounding out the top seven were Lydia Schilthorat, earning a season record, and junior Emma Thompson.

Our remaining team members had respectable races they can feel good about, but of particular note was senior Anna Benedict, who ran a season best with two recently broken toes! Another performance of note was from Olivia Landry who landed her third sub-29 minute 5k this season, and this being a time she did not hit until after six meets into the season last year!

Right now I feel like we are still trying to find our rhythm and flow. We seem to have a missing piece here and a missing piece there each meet and it’s never the same. I’m not making excuses, but rather making an observation. We have a strong team, we just haven’t all put things together on the same day to have as strong of a showing that I know our girls are capable of yet. With four meets under our belt, I think we are still dancing around our potential. However, I would rather be doing this now than in the later part of our season.

On a different note, it was great having Coach B at the invitational that boasts her name. It’s always nice to have her on hand providing support and encouragement, and I’m glad the day turned out as nice as it did, especially since we were unable to host this meet last year.