In another exciting weather meet in Hibbing on Thursday, September 29, the North Shore Storm cross country team (a combination of Cook County, Silver Bay, and Two Harbors runners) raced against 25 other teams from northern Minnesota. The weather had cooled significantly from the heat of earlier meets, but was colorful again, with strong winds, puffy clouds, some sun, peasized hail, and rainbows. The Girls Varsity team had several season personal best times, including Olya Wright who took 5th (19:48), Lamar Gordon in 10th (20:19), Jocelyn Carr in 27th (21:10), Sierra Geatz (21:19), and Lexi Surbaugh who took 46th (21:52). The combined scores of the top five runners gave them a 3rd place team finish, substantially behind Hibbing and just six points behind Rock Ridge. The Boys Varsity team also showed good times and great efforts, with Ian Thorpe coming in 5th with a season best (16:43), and Cyrus Myers in 30th (18:13), Elijah Smith in 40th (18:30), Tristan Sugbaugh with 56th (18:51) and Brayden Schmidt with 62nd (19:03). The Boys Varsity team placed 6th out of 25 teams. Top finishers in the JV race were Brianna Monson who took 5th, Emma Crook (11th), and Claire Lind (14th), Keean Selin (13th) and Adam Oberg (15th). For Junior High, Grace Swartz and Ryleigh Thorpe took 7th and 8th, and Georgi Dimtrov and Ethan Fish took 7th and 14th, respectively. The nice weather, flat course, and quick times made the meet a very positive event. Head coach April Wahlstrom comments, “Finally we have good vibes for this course.” This is no small thing, as the critical Sections Meet will take place at the same course in later October. “It was a season-best time for many,” she said, and also mentioned that many of the JV and JH runners are starting to take some risks, go out ahead, and show a lot of promise for future years.
