Green Hope Cross Country

The last invitational of the year was the NC Runners Elite Invitational on October 9^th. Almost everyone in the Cary area was awakened by a massive thunderstorm at about 4:30am so there was no need for an alarm to get the Falcons up for the carpool to Kernersville.  The early morning downpour gave way to a cool, damp morning as the Falcons converged on Ivey Redmon Park. 

The team was only entered to compete in 2 races on the day, the 1^st of which was the boys championship at 10:00.  The boys were the clear favorites coming in and they wanted to send another message as the season progressed into the championship portion of the schedule and they did not disappoint.  The boys went out hard and cruised to a winwith only 68pts (2^nd place had 115 pts).  The course proved to run a little slow on the day as it was very soggy, but the pack time of 27 seconds would prove to be the key to the team’s success.  Junior Gavin Hansen (9^th, 16:18), senior Jacob Kurak (11^th, 16:24), junior Luke Young (19^th, 16:43), senior Ben Cale (21^st, 16:44), and senior Zach Taylor (22^nd, 16:45) rounded out the scoring.  This was the 3^rd invitational winof the year for the boys.

The girls varsity has been slowly progressing this year,but would be without one of its top runners. The wanted to use the opportunity to get out and compete again on the state championship course as they hoped to be back here one more time on November 6^th.  By the time the girls hit the one mile mark it was clear senior Katie Foppiano was on a mission as she was just behind the lead pack. Even in the wet conditions she sprinted down the home stretch to break the 20:00 barrier for the 1^st time (19:57).  She was followed by Alicia Craia (20:51) and Grace Boughton (20:55).  Lisa Zhao hadher best time of the year (21:30) and Shea Sullivan set her career PR(21:31).  The girls finished in a respectable 10^th place in the championship race.