In Andover’s race against Northfield Mount Hermon (NMH) during Family Weekend, Andover Varsity Girls Cross Country had 14 runners cross the finish line before the second best runner from NMH, while the top seven JV runners finished within 37 seconds of each other.
Anoush Shehadeh ’15 broke yet another course record. Shehadeh set the new record at an outstanding 17:18, a full 19 seconds faster than the previous record of 17:37.
With dozens of parents and families watching, Andover runners zoomed past Northfield Mount Hermon (NMH) 19-44 in the varsity race and 15-50 in the junior varsity race.
“There’s one girl who is good on NMH’s team and I credit my race to her because she really pushed me out of my comfort zone in the first half mile before she fell behind,” said Shehadeh.
“I was honestly really surprised with my finishing time. I knew that I had gotten faster, but to cut 20 seconds from the course record in two weeks, well, I didn’t see that coming. My time of 17:17.8 was also my 5K PR [personal record]. As a team we are looking so strong and we finished 15 runners before NMH’s second runner finished and continued our undefeated season, which is fantastic,” continued Shehadeh. “I’m just happy I could run a strong race and help our team out as much as I could.”
The NMH racer behind Shehadeh finished second overall, with a time of 19:26. Peyton McGovern ’16 finished the race in third place with a time of 20:36.
Morgan Rooney ’17 credits the team as a whole for its success the season and hopes to continue the winning ways against Deerfield, through Exeter, and into Interschols.
“Our team this year is so strong and our packs keep getting closer and tighter together and I think this gives us a great chance of doing extremely well at Interschols in a few weeks!” said Rooney.
McGovern, Qiqi Ren ’15, Sharon Zhang ’16, Sharon Ruth Platt ’15, Sofia Barbosa ’16 and Gillian Cline ’16 finished within 60 seconds of each other in the varsity race.
When asked what allows Andover runners to blow by its opponents, Alana Gudinas ’16 responded, “People running up front push runners behind them to go faster, so when we run as a pack we pass more NMH runners.”
Rooney also believes that running in front of the parents inspired Andover runners to work harder and push themselves more than the team would in a normal race.
“Since I had not seen my parents in a while, I wanted to show them how much I’ve improved and having them there cheering me on really helped me push myself even farther than I thought I could,” said Rooney.
Alana Gudinas ’16, Rooney and Anna Kramer ’16 were the top three JV runners.
Next up on the schedule for Andover is a trip to Deerfield. Although the team feels more comfortable racing at home, it will look to use its momentum on the road as well.
