Oct. 27, the cross country team attended a meet at the Rockingham County Fairgrounds against Turner Ashby, Broadway, Rockbridge County and Spotswood. Sophomore Annie Poirot and Lena Blagg both ran in the meet. Poirot finished with a time of 20:57.30 and placed fifth overall. Blagg finished with a time of 22:21.00 and placed 12th overall. The average time for the girls teams was 21:59.00 and the average time for the boys team was 18:10.00.

Poirot is proud of her team’s and her own accomplishments at this week’s meet. 

“[The meet] went really well, I felt a lot stronger than I expected to be throughout the race and everybody did a really great job,” Poirot said. 

Similar to Poirot, Blagg feels that both herself and the team performed well in the meet, despite the challenges of the course they ran. 

“I think our team did really well, we all pushed through [even though] it wasn’t an easy course, but everyone stayed strong and pushed through the hard parts. For me personally, it wasn’t my best time, but I still felt like I did really [well],” Blagg said. 

Despite personal issues, Poirot was able to push herself to do her best in the race. 

“One of my close family members recently experienced an accident, so it was hard to push through that, but I just had to remember I’m racing for him today,” Poirot said. 

Likewise, a challenge that Blagg faced in the race was dealing with the constant hills that the course consisted of. 

“The first mile of this course was really hard because a lot of it [was] all uphill and of course going up hills is always a challenge,” Blagg said. 

Compared to other courses that Poirot has ran, this one was more challenging, but manageable. 

“[This course] was a little bit more challenging than some flat courses that we’ve [ran] before, but it was actually a lot better than I expected it to be,” Poirot said. 

Blagg also feels that this course was more challenging, but the weather was much better for running purposes. 

 “[Other courses we’ve] done have had more hills or [it was] hot weather, but it was nice out today and there [was] really only one bad hill,” Blagg said. 

Poirot decided not to set a goal time, instead she wanted to enjoy the race and not worry about her time. 

“I was just kind of going out there to have fun and to do the best I could do, so I’m happy with my time,” Poirot said. 

Considering the challenges on the course, there were some things that Blagg wished she could have done better. One of which is not starting off the race as strong as she would’ve liked. 

“I probably could have run my first mile a little faster or just faster in all, but sometimes I tend to hold back,” Blagg said. “Maybe [if] I just pushed [myself] harder in the beginning I would have done better.”