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Going on 18 years now, Coe-Brown has hosted one of the more competitive invitationals on the schedule featuring its rolling and challenging course. Most years the Black Bear Invitational attracts the region’s most competitive schools to Northwood, but as the New Englands are hosted by CT this year, many of the top teams have opted to head to Wickham Park to preview the course via their invitational held on the same day. However, the Black Bear still will be fast and furious as there are a handful of ranked schools and those who aspire to be ranked as well as our independent school friends. And obviously with these teams comes several of the best individuals as well. Feel free to get there early as this meet will also feature highly competitive middle school races beginning at 9:00am! See the future of NHCC!
Girls
Judging by the results from MI49, the team favorites for this one has to be Phillips Exeter Academy. Led by Ava Bullock, they placed 6th overall in the Large School Race. Led by Amelia Akvazzi, Phillips Academy will be there strongest challenger as they finished a mere 1 point behind NH#4 ranked Exeter. NH’s best hope to upset this apple cart will be our #5 ranked school Hopkinton. Led by MI49’s small school individual champ Maddy Lane, Hopkinton was behind Exeter on the merge; however, this was without their #3 runner. If Hopkinton has a full line-up, things will be quite interesting on Saturday.
If any of the aforementioned falter, expect newly ranked Dover (#10) to take advantage. Led by the Poulin sisters, Anique and Janelle, the Green Wave had a nice race this past weekend. Judging by their previous years, they certainly improve as the season progresses.
Individually, seems as if Lane is the favorite this weekend as she had the fastest time at MI49 among the Black Bear entries. Look for Phillips Academy’s Alvazzi to be her largest challenge. After those 2, Dover’s Anique Poulin should be leading the chase pack which should be comprised of PEA’s Bullock, Goffstown’s Kara Tschida, Sanborn’s Kaitlin Stocker, Coe-Brown’s Paige Murdough, and Fall Mountain’s Anna Fillion.
Boys
The boys race will feature one of the best runners in the country. Tam Gavenas of Phillips Academy is simply one of best in the USA. He finished 3rd at Footlocker Nationals last year and has looked incredible in the first mile of the season. His winning time of 15:24 at Derryfield last week AFTER it was lengthened to a full 5k, may be one of the most impressive runs on that course ever. Along with this, Gavenas’s team Phillips Academy of Andover is one of the main contenders on Saturday by virtue of their 8th place finish at MI49 where they beat 3 NH ranked schools. Matter of fact, their rivals from Exeter, Phillips Exeter Academy is also a contender. They were 9th last week also beating 3 NH ranked schools and were led by Bocelli Howland Vlahakis.
Host school Coe-Brown may have a say in the matter. They ran in the small school race placing 2nd at MI49 a performance was good for a new 4th ranking in the state of NH. Led by freshman Patrick Youngs and senior Luc Kerouac, the Bears had a :46 pack time, the best on the day. While their average team time is not as fast as Phillips Academy (buoyed by Gavenas’s 15:24), they are right with PEA at 17:35 and 17:36 respectively. These stats indicate a close race between these 3 teams. NH#10 Alvirne is also slated to compete. Led by Brent Dunning, Alvirne will be looking to add to their momentum they built at MI49.
Individually, obviously Gavenas is the heavy favorite to win and potentially break the course record. The real race will be for 2nd. Watch for Con-Val’s Will Simard and PEA’s Howland Vlahakis to duke it out. The chase pack should include Sanborn’s Jake Pitre, Alvirne’s Brent Dunning, PEA’s William Miller, Phillips Luke Williamson, CBNA’s Youngs, Kerouac, Ben Larson and Ben Jobin. As always we will be there videoing, snapping pics, interviewing! Good luck to all!
