Cross Country Ends Without State Qualafier

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Carscallen Photo

Adam Voight sprints to the finish in a home meet.

The Eagle cross country team had a very rare season this year in which no runners received the honor to advance to the state cross country meet. This was a big disappointment for the program since Head Coach Greg Letts has had a very long streak of runners qualifying for the Eagles.

The injuries and sickness lingered around cross country team all year and  it was near impossible for these runners to improve because of all the issues. A major setback for the team was senior Josh Ramirez being injured early in the season.

Senior Kristin Shore said that despite the immediate success of the team, this was more of a development year.  “It was different than my first three years because we always had at least one runner go to state.  But it will be exciting to see how the younger athletes will do as they progress through the program.”

His hip flexors were holding him back from competing at every meet and participating in every practice. Prior to the injury he seemed destined to qualify for the state meet due to him being a top ten runner in the Mount Hood Conference for the 2015 season.

Aside from no one qualifying for the state meet, the team as a whole didn’t seem so successful throughout the regular season either. Near the end of the season the team earned a win over the Gresham Gophers cross country team, but besides that the team didn’t acquire any other wins.

On the other hand, due to the injured runners working through therapy, they are now in good condition to run and are working towards a more successful season next year.

As long as runners continue to be healthy next year, the team will most likely advance some runners to the state meet.