With clouds darkening the sky above Johnson County Community College and a high chance of rain on the morning of Oct. 25 the varsity cross country runners made their way to the team tent to prepare for the regional meet, the stepping stone to State that next Saturday.
Going into the meet, both sides of the team, boys and girls, were bent on performing the best they could. The girls were determined to place well and fight for position as a team. Even with injuries plaguing both the girl’s and boy’s sides, the runners were positive and ready for the race.
“I think we were all really excited,” sophomore Adelyn Rohr said. “We had a lot of younger people on the regional team, so we weren’t sure how we were going to do overall, but [Coach] Wannamaker talked to us the day before, and he said that he expected us to do really good, so I wasn’t too worried.”
The boys team, rebuilding their varsity lineup from graduating its top five members, were determined to compete with the other teams in their region as best they could. Told to fight for position, specifically with runners from SM East, their main competition this meet. Many runners would go on to achieve personal records.
“We were hoping to be able to stack up against Shawnee Mission East and Shawnee Mission West,” junior Michael Voth said. “We knew that we weren’t going to win the meet or anything. Individually, I was trying to run under 17 minutes and 30 seconds. I ended up running 17 minutes and 16 seconds.”
Weather can have a large impact on a race goes, with many runners considering the best temperatures for running being in the 50 to 60 degree range. The day of regionals was just this, 57 degrees around 9 a.m. and would stay that way for the remainder of the day, never rising above 60 degrees. Along with the temperature, light rain would fall over the course, getting progressively harder as each race ended.
“The conditions were actually pretty good for my race, it was supposed to be pretty cold and rainy, but because I had the first race it really didn’t start raining until I was almost done running.” junior Kate Hipp said. “Rain can affect a lot about your run, just like humidity levels can affect your breathing. They said that if it got too muddy from the rain, they would actually have to change out people’s spikes, because you use spikes to dig into the ground, so if the mud is really bad you can use longer spikes, so that obviously affects running performance.”
Prior to the regional meet, several members of the top 10 runners on the boys side suffered season ending injuries–stress fractures in two cases with juniors Holden Greengo and Carter Svarvari–pulling up runners from the top of the JV team to fill their spots. When the team got to the meet, sophomore runner James Hembree was told that he was the last minute replacement for freshman Carter O’Neil, who had called in sick the night before.
“The day of, I was number eight, but I still didn’t think I was going to run or anything,” Hembree said. “I knew that there was a chance, [Carter] was sick at the team dinner and Wannamaker had pulled me aside the day before, when Carter wasn’t feeling good, and told me to be prepared to run, so I was ready.”
With all the challenges surrounding things they couldn’t control, the runners pre-race nerves started building too. The feeling of the race rapidly encroached on them and the expectations they had for themselves and those of the team weighing on their shoulders.
“I was feeling a little pressure because, or not really pressure, but I was nervous because if there was any chance of me not getting in the top 15, and I was kind of stressed out about it a little bit,” Jansen said. “But I got through it so it was good…I think we all handled it pretty well.”
As soon as the starter’s gun went off, any doubt that the runners had was sent to the back of their minds. The Raider runners went on to achieve many PR’s on the girls and boys side, with five of the seven boys runners achieving them.
“For the most part, everyone was really happy with how we performed,” Voth said. “We all hit the times that we wanted, but, as it happens most of the time, we all felt like we left just a little bit out there, that we could have pushed a little bit harder. But yeah, for the most part, we all accomplished our goals.”
Following the races, the only runner on either side of the regional team to advance to state would be Jansen, who placed 8th with a time of 16:37. The boys team placed 6th with a score of 123, and the girls team placed 5th with a score of 142. Jansen will run at the state meet at Rim Rock Farm on Saturday, Nov. 1.
“Rim Rock is a really hard course, especially the third mile,” Jansen said. “It’s very uphill, and I want to be strong in that mile so I can hopefully be passing a lot of people, that will be when I want to get into the top 20.”
