Maura Brunt ‘27
Maura Kane ‘27
EE Staff Writers
With September ending soon, many fall sports at THS are in full gear as they are nearing and passing the midway point of their seasons. The THS Girls Cross Country team this year has swung into action having already competed in 4 successful meets and a scrimmage.
The Girls Cross Country team’s first official practice this year was on Monday, August 18th, and it was an eventful start to the season- having a surprise shower pour on them, shortening all outdoor sports’ practices early. Despite this, the team wore their smiles and did some mini workouts while waiting for their rides.
Their first official meet was a dual meet at Darien High School, competing against Darien, New Canaan, and St. Joseph’s. In the Junior Varsity race, Trumbull held 3 of the top 5 spots- Sophomores Penelope Orrico, Mia Romano and Abbey Matera placing 1st, 3rd and 4th. Overall, our Girl’s JV team got 1st with a score of 30 points. The Varsity race also went well with Trumbull placing in 3 of the top 10 spots- Senior Jane Hall getting 4th, Sophomore Maura Kane and Junior Lauren Ash placing 7th and 9th respectively.
That following weekend the team had an invitation at Allen’s Meadow in Wilton. The girls participated in 3 different races – a 1.5 mile freshmen run, and a 4K race for both the JV and Varsity girls. Invitational races like this one involve many more teams than the team’s usual dual meets, with Varsity racing against 21 other teams. A massive highlight of this race was when Freshman Rebecca Drury came in 8th place during the freshmen race with a time of 10:08.77.
The last two race days have been home meets at Trumbull High School! These races were especially interesting as the XC course has been modified this year, so it was fairly new to everybody on the team. Despite this, the team had a successful day on the 17th competing against Warde, Greenwich and Ridgefield. The Varsity team came in 1st, with a final score of 29. In the varsity race, 5 of THS runners placed within the top 10; Maura Kane, Jane Hall, Lauren Ash, Nikki Adorante, and Emma Fahy.
During Tuesday’s race the team had even more success and progress as both of the races went extremely well. JV scored 18, placing them 1st. Among them, Junior Madden Gray, and Sophomore Penelope Orrico placed first and second, respectively, with times under 12 minutes on the 1.7 mile course. The Varsity team also did an exceptional job as Sophomore Maura Kane achieved a new PR of 20:47.54, and the rest of the varsity team also achieved PRs as well! The Trumbull girl’s team was able to place for 7 out of the top 10 spots, and they overall got 1st place with a score of 22.
Tuesday was also senior night – so all the seniors ran the varsity race (excluding the managers) and got celebrated afterwards! The Cross Country team has 10 seniors. These include Jane Hall, Lily Mickiewicz, Gwen Leonard, Aarushi Sharma, Angela Ulaj, Klara Schempp, Ida Hoem, Jiya Malhotra, Vanessa Herrera, and Kibali O’Donald.
Today, the team will be heading off to Wickham Park to compete in another invitational. In this specific event they are competing in the 3 separate races, yet all running 5Ks. This will be a challenging course as it will become the longest race the JV, and some of the Freshmen, have run. This specific course also has a difficult hill near the midway point of the race nicknamed “The Green Monster”. This meet has the team competing against a huge number of teams, like their previous invitational at Wilton.
The Trumbull Girls Cross Country team has had a good start to their season, but they are far from done as they still have a lot more future opportunities of success in their next races – including a dual meet at Wilton on October 1, a dual meet at Danbury on October 8 and their FCIAC Championship on the 16th of October, which will be the last race for many of the Junior Varsity runners, but not the end for the Varsity. Good luck girls!