Cross country teams battle elements for fine showing
From left, freshman Jonas Kinsey, sophomore Michael Payano and team captain senior Will Garrison running together at a recent home meet.
On a rainy and windy September 30, the Shelter Island varsity boys and girls cross country teams traveled to Firemen’s Field in Ridge for the Tom Knipfing Memorial Cross Country Invitational.
About 500 athletes, boys and girls, competed in one of three races, the Varsity A 5K race for Class A schools, the Varsity B 5K race for Class B, C and D schools, or the freshman 1.7 mile race. This was our first time participating in this event since cross country was reintroduced to the Shelter Island School in 2014.
All our runners achieved new personal records on this very flat and fast course.
Our girls raced first in the Girls Varsity B race of 71 athletes. In a race decided by fractions of a second, junior Lindsey Gallagher took second place with a very stout time of 19:09.34. It was exciting to watch Lindsey and Mount Sinai’s best female runner, Noreen Guilfoyle, battle from start to finish, against the elements, in an extremely close and hard fought race. Lindsey and Ms. Guilfoyle (19:08.70) posted the fastest female race times of the day for all races present.
Also scoring for the Indians were freshman Emma Gallagher in ninth place (21:51.13), junior Caitlin Binder (25:01.61), 7th grader Emma Martinez Majdisova (26:33.70) and junior Francesca Frasco (27:10.15). The team was rounded out by junior Isabella Sherman (28:27.85) and freshman Abigail Kotula (35:50.52). With Binder, Frasco and Kotula still on the mend with their best races ahead of them, the girls varsity team were still able to place a very respectable fourth place out of eight teams.
The weather did not let up for the boys varsity B race of 93 athletes. The boys team made a very strong impression by taking first place out of eight teams. In reviewing all the times, if the boys were entered in the Varsity A race, they would have taken first place in that race as well. Freshman Kal Lewis (17:00.30) took first place, junior Joshua Green (17:28.10) took second, senior Will Garrison (18:37.74) took sixth, freshman Jonas Kinsey (19:11.26) took 14th and sophomore Michael Payano (19:13.76) took 15th.
The remaining Indians posted great times as follows: junior Jack Lang (19:44.21), 8th grader Domingo Gil Jr. (20:06.44), 8th grader Tyler Gulluscio (20:22.65), 8th grader Brandon Payano (20:39.31), freshman Walter Richards (22:34.98), sophomore Roi Carbajal (22:36.05) and 7th grader Pacey Cronin (25:17.97).
The cross country teams do not have any races this week. The next race will be Tuesday, October 11 at Cedar Point County Park, followed by the Brown University Invitational in Rhode Island on October 15.
