By Emerald Briggs
After a shortened long run on Sunday, we officially entered States Week. On Monday, we had a mini workout to start. After a 15-minute warm-up, the team met Coach LaPlume at the bottom of Football Field Hill. We had to run 2-3 repeats of about an 800m loop, going easy on the ups and then hard on the downs. We ran these in reverse from the normal football loop to ensure no turned ankles occurred in the woods. After these, we jogged over to the grass track to run 2-6x200m strides with a hammer on the penultimate one. Finally, a cooldown of 10 minutes. Tuesday was a 30-40 minute easy run. A few of the girls made a trip to the New Hampton fish hatchery, sadly finding out that the fish would soon be gone for a while. This was a final fish farewell.
Wednesday we held our last speed tune-up on the grass track before D3s. This was a 10-minute warmup and cooldown and 6-10×200-meter repeats with 30 seconds of rest. DudePlume gave us target times based on the results from Moonlight Madness. After, the team headed to the weight room to meet Coach K for a lift and core session. Coaching the lift and core wasn’t her only accomplishment that day, as Kendra won her one-sided race against a local runner after closing the gap on him in the last 400m of her run. He had no idea what was coming, and still has no idea what hit him.
The next day, we had a 30-minute easy run and 4x100m float-fly-float strides. A float-fly-float stride means that you are running 5k pace for the first part, then kick pace in the middle, and closing with 5k pace again. The entire week Coach K has been telling us to make sure we’re eating lots of carbs and this day was no different. Luckily for cross-country athletes, this was no challenge as carbs are our best friends. Thursday was also the senior’s prep day, so after practice, the seniors headed to the store to prepare for Friday. While there, it seemed like half the team met up by accident, with Tucker, Ceili, Reece (and family), Emerald, and DudePlume all seeing each other at the local Hannaford.
Friday was pre-meet and Senior Sauce, so it was hype. Senior Sauce is a big pasta dinner with the whole team and their families and each senior competes to create the best sauce. Seniors are allowed to skip practice if they choose to start their sauce early while the rest of the team heads off to their shrines. Once finished with our shrine runs, we headed inside and were welcomed with the smell of all the sauces being produced. The underclassmen are supposed to mainly stay in room 106, our home base, while seniors finish up next door. Typically, we watch a movie, but this year no one was tech-smart enough to figure it out (Evan, we needed you!), so we found other ways to entertain ourselves. This included an intense game of heads-up and a taste-testing of the championship pickles the team made in pre-season. In my opinion, they tasted good and had a good texture, but some people thought they were too spicy (AKA LaPlume, who had tears when he drank the juice). Finally, the sauces were done and families started to pour in. The first round of spaghetti was super choppy, almost like shredded cheese, so it made for an interesting taste test. We had Josie, Tucker, Lizzie, and the Coach’s sauces to judge. Captain Josie took the crown with a huge lead. Besides the sauces, a highlight of the night was Emerald’s surprise cupcakes. Stemming from an old joke between Emerald and Josie, the cupcakes had an inside filling of spaghetti. These cupcakes caught many off guard, including Principal Roberts, Coach LaPlume, and many other poor souls. Once Senior Sauce was over, it was time to go home, forget about cross country for a few hours, and rest for the next day.
After the long bus ride to Derryfield, the girls got ready by finishing braiding their hair, getting glittered up, and making sure our ChicknLegs Pickle Shorts were looking their best. Toeing the line in box #9, Coach LaPlume’s favorite number, we headed off at the sound of the gun. As the plan goes every year, the team made sure not to go out too hard, yet keep people in sight, as we know the second mile very well and would need some steam for that. In the end, the girl’s team placed 3rd, qualifying everyone to run at MOCs the next Saturday. This team performance is tied for the best a Newfound girl’s team has ever done at states, matching it with the 2005 state meet when Emma Lundberg won and led her team to a 3rd place finish. Individually, we had 2 in the top 25. Emerald came out with a 7th-place finish after a tight battle and Ceili placed 17th. Addie came in 32nd, Charlotte in 45th, Josie in 56th (her last race at Derryfield!), Sophie in 71st, and Reece in 81st.
It was time for the boys to face the course once we were done. The boys started in box 4 and used the same strategy to start. Due to sickness, one of the top boy’s team scorers, Wyatt, was out. The team was down a runner, so Lizzie stepped up and easily took on the role. After tearing up the course, the boys ended up in 11th even being down a man. Colin finished first for the guy’s team in 8th place. Jack placed 89th being our 3rd man for the day. Brady and Zach, our two dual sporters (soccer), ran great and placed 18th and 108th respectively. For this only being Brady’s 4th and Zach’s 2nd cross-country race ever, this was awesome to see. Jacoby came in next after Zach for 138th, Lizzie in 141st, and Tucker in 151st. Colin and Brady will be moving on to MOCs. This ended up being a great day to race and we came home with some great results! Go Bears!
