On Oct. 12th New Trier varsity girls cross country came in 6th at their annual invitational in Wheeling.

Despite having a long weekend and fewer runners than they anticipated, the team was still able to have a successful weekend. The top seven varsity runners didn’t race, allowing a lineup of younger runners to take charge.

One of these young varsity runners is sophomore, Colleen Charcut. She was very proud of the 6th place finish for the team.

“New Trier placed 6th, which was really good considering our top seven runners didn’t run in the meet,” said Charcut. “It was really cool to see some girls step up to the plate of a varsity race.”

Not only was this invite a success for varsity runners, but junior varsity got 1st and the freshmen team got 3rd. Overall, the team has had a very good season due to the hard work they put towards their practices.

This invitational was challenging, and many girls had to dig deep to be successful. The team ran hills during the practices leading up to the meet in order to build endurance. The Wheeling invite is held at Heritage Park which has a large hill that put this endurance to the test.

The temperature added to the difficulty of the meet as well. Saturday’s high in Wheeling was a frigid 55 degrees which forced the team to make some adjustments.

“The cold mainly affected our mindsets, just because we haven’t faced that type of weather yet but we adjusted our race plans so we always had someone by us to stay positive,” said Charcut.

Sophomore Anna Mathy noticed that the cold affected how the girls dressed and prepared for their races. The typical track uniform does not cover much, so the girls had to wear additional clothes.

“Because it was cold, many people wore Under Armour under their uniforms which may have caused their times to be slower than had they not had to wear extra clothes. It was also hard to stay warm in between races,” said Mathy.

The team saw this invite as an opportunity to prepare for their Central Suburban League Conference which is this Saturday Oct. 19. Last season, the girls finished first in their conference, regional, and sectional invites.

As of right now, the team is focused on upcoming state in early November. The team finished 7th at state in 2018 and haven’t finished 1st since 2011, so the team has really put an emphasis on harder workouts this year.

“For state the team has been focusing on cutting down our times during the workouts to prepare for post season races,” said Charcut.

Freshman Clare Finnagan agrees that the team has been working hard to prepare for state. Along with more intense workouts throughout the week, the team has also been setting goals to get in the mindset for the competition.

“We have been working extra hard in our workouts and setting goals on how we want to perform when State comes around,” said Finnagan. “The New Trier cross country team is a very positive environment and our goal is to get better taking it on one week at a time.”