Congratulations Cross Country on an Outstanding Season!!

The Spartan Harriers wrapped up their seasons this past Saturday at the OHSAA Cross Country

State Championship on what turned out to be a perfect day for running at Fortress Obetz in
Columbus.

The girls team started things off and were led by a strong showing from Sam Erbach who
finished the 5 kilometer course in 18:40.7, a full 14 seconds faster than she ran at the state
meet in 2020. That was good enough to earn Sam her second cross country state
championship podium in as many years, this time as the 11th place finisher overall, and broke
her own school record by more than 4 seconds.

Following Sam were Emme Greely, Maria Gill, and Kyla Harvey who finished 56th (Emme -
19:48.3), 59th (Maria - 19:49.2), and 60th (Kyla - 19:50.5) respectively. As they have all year,
the trio of sophomores started out strong and steadily moved up through the field as a pack,
each passing more than 50 runners between the 1 mile mark and the finish.

Rounding out the top-5, and finishing as the final scorer for the Lady Spartans, was Alyza Camp
who grinded her way through a tough race and ran her second best time of the season (21:32.4)
to finish 143rd overall.

Finishing 6th and 7th for the Lady Spartans were Senior Rachel Ingle (156th - 21:52.9) and
Freshman Becca Drew (158th - 21:56.8). Rachel has led this team as one of the Senior Captain
all season and capped off her final campaign with her first ever appearance at the state
championship meet. Becca, by contrast, is running cross country for the first time this year and
steadily improved all season to run a massive 27 second personal record on Saturday. And she
did so despite suffering a fall in the last mile of the race that tore off her racing bib (which,
importantly, includes her timing chip) and forced her to cross the finish line while holding it in her
hand.

As a team, the girls stacked up very well and finished 6th out of the 20 teams that were
represented in what turned out to be the strongest field and most competitive race for the team
title in over a decade. Congratulations Lady Spartans on a great season and an outstanding
state meet performance.

On the boys side, the Spartans were represented by sophomore Jonas King who ran a great
race in wet and muddy conditions at the Southwest Regional Championships to finish 13th
overall and qualify as an individual for Saturday’s state championship meet. This was Jonas’
second trip to the Fortress and he showed that experience as well as his overall grit and
resiliency as he navigated his way through a fast race to finish 115th overall in 17:22.6.
Congratulations Jonas, and the rest of the Spartan Harriers, on a great season!