As the summer winds down, the cross country athletes of Benet Academy are gearing up for yet another exciting season of competition against a multitude of teams. With a whole 3 months of summer training under their belt, this year’s cross country team is ready to display the efforts of rigorous offseason work. Throughout the summer, the team worked together on distance runs, track workouts, tempo runs, hill workouts, High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) workouts, and everything in between to become better and more well-rounded athletes. After 6 weeks of Monday-Thursday training, there was a brief intermission between summer training and the official start of the season.

By early August, there was a good sense of what the team will look like, but it is only on the Wednesday that heralds in the season when the cross country team takes its shape for the year. However, the incoming team this year is going to be, both on the surface and within, a completely different team than seen in prior seasons.
With the unfortunate loss of 4 critical varsity runners of the class of 2017, the future was nebulous for the lady Redwings. The team edged out Marist for the Conference championship by a single point in the previous season, moved on past Regionals after a 6th place tie, and fell at 8th place in the Sectional meet, with Mae Tully moving on as an individual to the State meet. Despite the loss of a talented senior class, however, the remaining 8 varsity runners consisted of all underclassmen.

In addition to them, the elite incoming freshman class has a sizable group of runners already in the front of the pack, with several more still discovering their running potential. With new additions to the front runners of the team and a large returning group of devoted runners, the team is headed in an unfamiliar yet exhilarating direction. The returning coaching staff of Mr. Scott Brooks, Mr. Greg Frey, and Mrs. Katie Pazski are enthusiastic about the commencement of the season. The competition schedule for the lady Redwings can be found on the Benet Athletics website.