Big Red XC Annihilates Andover
After emerging from the woods, neck and neck with an Andover runner, upper Varun Oberai overtook his competitor in the final stretch of the race. Oberai’s performance reflected Exeter’s performance as a whole—both Junior Varsity (JV) and Varsity on the girls’ and boys’ teams beat Andover and many members of each team reached new personal records.
Senior and captain Maddie Machado elaborated on the girls’ JV performance. “Our JV team raced first, and we were a little nervous watching them start the race because there were three or four Andover runners that took the lead right away,” she said. “By the time the racers came back to the final 500 meters, we had two really surprising personal bests from Emma Chen and Claire Fu. They are both new runners this year, and they both ran over 30 seconds faster than they had at any other race this season to come in third and fourth.”
Senior and co-captain Lucy Gilchrist noted JV’s consistent performance over the course of the meet. “JV’s entire last mile made the difference between winning and losing,” Gilchrist said. “Awesome perseverance.”
A highlight of the JV race was senior Madeline Huh’s performance, noted upper Caroline Luff. “Madeline Huh [won] the race for us,” she said. “Exeter and Andover were tied, and the scoring went to the 6th running on each team and Madeline beat the Andover #6 runner.”
Varsity runners achieved new times as well, Machado added. “For Varsity, I want to highlight Sophie Cohen and Kaitlyn Flowers, who both broke the 20:00 barrier for the first time this season to come in first and third, respectively,” Machado said. ‘Andover’s course is on the challenging side because it’s isolated in the woods for the majority of the time, and there are a couple really tough hills, so it’s really incredible that they were able to pull off such fast times.”
For the Varsity runners, upper Gia Pisano’s performance especially stood out during the race, Luff said. “In the varsity race a highlight was seeing Gia Pisano’s kick across the final 1k of the course—it was awesome,” she said.
The success of the team, according to Luff, can be attributed to preparation outside of the meet. “We owe our success to our hard training and close team dynamic,” Luff said. “We work so hard on each workout and make sure to push each other to our limits. Whether that is running 7.5 miles at 6:15 a.m. or an easy run during GH, we give it our all. But we also have so much fun, and our team is extremely close this year, which helps us lift each other up and pack up more in races.”
Luff noted the personal records broken by the team. “There were over 19 season and lifetime personal records set in both races, which is really amazing considering Andover has an extremely hilly and difficult course,” she said.
The boys’ team also had many successes. According to lower Tommy Seidel, highlights of the team included the performances by Oberai, senior Lenny Chen and preps Mateo Connelly and Oliver Brandes. “Lots of people went out really strong and stayed very strong,” Seidel said.
The team’s improvement, Seidel explained, is due to the dynamic between runners. “We have an epic team culture,” Seidel said. “We’re really tight-knit team and everyone supports each other.”
Chen elaborated on his new record during this race. “That was probably the best race I’ve ran my whole life,” he said. “I’ve been running for seven years, so that is saying something. I kind of fed off the team and the hype going into the race and then I think that allowed me to have a really good race.”
After a week of less intense practices, “tapering,” the runners were primed to perform well in the meet. “Training-wise we’re in out taper period right now, which means running less miles,” Chen said. “All in all, I think as a team we felt rested and ready to run.”
For Brandes, the motivating team culture helped him succeed in the race. “I packed up with other people in the JV roster,” he said. “That really helped me throughout the race because I got a big cramp in the middle. Seeing my friends around my fellow teammates around me helped me keep going.”
Chen is excited to perform well as a team in the rest of the season. “Before this race, a bunch of seniors helped me prepare and bounce back from the prior race,” he said. “Definitely my hope going into the end of the season is success for the team, as a whole.”
Reflecting upon the team wide success, Machado is fired up for their last meet of the season. “We’re looking forward to racing at NMH for interschols next weekend, which is also a notoriously hilly course,” she said. “It was good to race at Andover to gauge how our team’s doing with hill work.”