County Harriers Ready to Take on Western Mass Field
Few are bemoaning the decision to move the Western Mass cross country championships from hilly Northfield to Westfield's Stanley Park -- certainly not the runners themselves.
"I'm excited for Westfield," Lenox senior Emily Tibbetts said shortly after winning the Berkshire County title on Halloween Day. "It's so flat and so fast, hopefully we can gt some good times there, too.
"I really do like Westfield. There's a good downhill at the beginning and not many uphills at all. It's a big change from Northfield. I like the downhills at Northfield but definitely not that first mile. So we don't have to do anything like that again this season, which is nice."
With Northfield Recreation Area unavailable due to a construction project at the site, the sectional meet was moved to Westfield, and since its Western Mass' turn to host the state championships, the harriers who prevail in Saturday's Western Mass meet will return on Nov. 14 to take on the best the commonwealth has to offer.
Tibbetts and the Millionaires figure to once again be the team to beat in region. Last fall, the Lenox girls ran away, literally, with the Division 2 title, placing four runners in the top five and a fifth, then-freshman Emily Jarck, in 15th place to compile 27 points, easily outpacing runner-up Mohawk Trail (82 points).
All five of Lenox's scorers return this fall, along wih teammates Alice Huth and Ella King, who as sophomores placed in the top 50 of the the 138-girl D2 field.
On the boys side, Mount Greylock will look to defend its fifth-straight Western Mass title, but the Mounties will have a drastically different look than the team that conquered Northfield last fall.
Only senior Tommy Kirby returns from last November, when he was the lone non-senior among the top six runners. That means he is the leading returner in Western Mass, and he is coming off a season in which he was named the most valuable runner in Berkshire County by the league's coaches.
And, like Tibbetts, he is a fan of Stanley Park.
"I really like Northfield because I like downhills, but track is nice, too, and this will be a lot like track," Kirby said after winning the county title at Reid Middle School.
Mount Greylock's other four scorers from last year's sectional title team have graduated, but now sophomore Owen Brandriss finished 20th at Northfield. And last year's understudies for coach Scott Burdick have blossomed into a team that went undefeated in dual meet competition this fall.
Saturday's action gets under way at 1 p.m. with the Division 2 girls race. The Division 1 girls follow a half an hour later with the D2 boys and D1 boys after that.
Lenox's girls, who have dominated the county scene for two seasons, are used to running with bullseyes on their backs. And they're prepared to defend their title.
"We raced [at Stanley Park] at the Bay State Invitational, where the girls won their division," Lenox coach Jeanne Teasdale said. "It was good practice on the course. We wanted to see what it was to race there because we'd never raced there before. We're prepared as far as training for it. It's nice and flat. There are a couple of little hills. But if you train in the Berkshires, you know there are plenty of hills.
"The hill workouts we do, it's like speed work in disguise. Our girls for years have always been strong on the hills. We do serious hill training. That gives us our strength, but that also gives us our speed, too."