By Emerald Briggs
We began our last official week of the Newfound cross-country season on Monday. While a few outside people kept coming to practice this week, it was mainly the girl’s team and Colin remaining. As of Monday, we had no idea if Brady was going to run on Saturday because of his possible soccer events interfering. Luckily, later in the week, he found out he’d be able to race (not luckily for him though, as they lost). Anyways, for our workout, LaPlume had a threshold run planned for us at the Fit Trail. The warm-up was the run over to the Fit Trail, then we ran 20 minutes at a threshold pace, and then a cool down back to the high school. Following the run, we did a care bear workout led by Coach Kendra.
Tuesday was an easy 30-40 minute run with strides at the end. On Wednesday we had our last speed day before MOCs. After our track warmup lap, we headed over to the dreaded grass track for one final hoorah (thank goodness!). Thanks to a conversation with Mike Smith, I was made aware that I may not have clarified what this grass track means and why we hate it. Basically, it’s in the grass area next to the road and it briefly runs on our race course before taking a turn and looping back to the start. It is 400 meters, so the length of a typical track. It is highly disliked due to bad footing with holes, long grass, and sharp turns you have to take. For this final workout, we had an extended warm-up of 3 laps on the grass track and then 6 laps at a tempo pace. After this, we had two 200m strides and a 10-minute cooldown. Since it was Workout Wednesday, we finished practice by making our way to the gym for a lift and core session with Coach K.
The MOC qualifiers hopped into the vans on Thursday and headed to run a course preview at Alvirne. Of course, since it was Halloween, many interesting costumes were worn. While at Alvirne, we ran the entire course easy and then did 2-3 strides at both the starting line and 2-3 strides at the finish (making sure to not run through the line). After packing it up back in the van, it was time for the most exciting part of the trip. For the past few years, the team has gone to Chipotle and Tutti Frutti for fro-yo after the preview. At this point, it’s a tradition. Friday was the final day before MOCs. Everyone ran an easy shrine run and we had a team talk on the track. It was time to trust our fitness and race the next day.
The bus ride down on Saturday involved lots of getting ready. Addie had to finish braiding everyone’s hair since she was the sole team braider. The rest of us got glittered up and made sure to play hype songs. Once we got there, we set up our ice tent and laced our shoes, ready to race. The girl’s box was right next to many familiar faces from fellow D3 teams. At 2:30, the gun went off and we sprinted out of box 23. Team-wise, we placed 16th which is the highest ever at MOCs for a Newfound girl’s team. The 2005 team led by Emma Lundberg placed 17th. Everyone was super pumped once LaPlume told us this on the bus ride back. Individually, our girls ran some solid fast times. We had 2 runners in the top 100, Emerald who placed 28th, and Ceili who placed 60th. Addie was 110th, Sophie was 129th, Captain Josie was 130th (pack running!), Charlotte was 133rd, and Reece was 140th. Sadly, this was Captain Josie’s last ever cross-country race. In the boy’s race, we had 2 runners, Colin and Brady. Both boys finished in the top 100. Colin came in 42nd and Brady came in 87th. While cheering on the boys, some of the girls’ team headed out to hunt for BeReal’s with fellow NHXC members. We successfully captured 6 different BeReals. Shoutout to the Gilford, Hopkinton, Newmarket, and Keene teams for participating and to Davio, Mike Smith, and Tim Cox for taking one (or two) with us as well!
After arriving back at the high school, the team headed over to Addie’s house for our annual post-MOC spaghetti party. As the name suggests, we ate lots of pasta and garlic bread that night. After food, it was time for the games to begin. The games we played consisted of ghost in the graveyard, manhunt, and hide and scream outside in the dark. Lots of running around and screaming finished up the night. The school season is now officially over for us, but many of our athletes will continue to run for Valhalla and the Junior Olympics.
