Hi, I’m Angelina and I’m a senior at Sarasota High School. I’m very grateful for the opportunity to write a blog for DistancePreps, and so far it looks like a successful start to the 2014 cross country season! Being a senior, unfortunately this will be my last high school season. The knowledge of this pushed me to train very hard over the summer in order to be able to make my last year my best.

Last weekend, my teammates and I drove over to Jacksonville to participate in the Katie Caples Invitational. This was quite an experience since it was my first nighttime cross country meet, adding an extra element to the race. This meet also gave our team the opportunity to compete against one of the fastest teams in the state, Bolles. The race started out at a quick pace, and the fact that we were racing at night added to the usual excitement in the opening hundred meters of the race. My teammates really  stepped up to the plate, running great times for this early in the season. I was satisfied with my time as well, beginning this season much faster than I was at the start of last year. We came in second as a team, which was an exciting start to what I can foresee as being an amazing year.

This past Saturday, we participated in a race slightly closer to home: the North Port Invite.

This provided us with the opportunity to race some local teams as well as others from across the state. The morning started out with a bit of nasty weather, but luckily the rain ceased by the time we were lining up at the start. However, it left the course in a bit of a muddy state, especially the beginning flat stretch of grass. The upside of the stormy weather was that the temperature was fairly cool, a rare occurrence in Florida.

The race started out at a fairly fast pace and the course narrowed quickly, preventing easy maneuvering through the pack. By the first mile, I had weaved my way through and was in position to move up to the lead pack. My teammate Sage was up there already, and we worked together along with the other girls through the two mile. At that point, I was feeling strong and decided to take a risk and pull away from the pack. It was a weird feeling for me to be leading a race and I felt slightly confused, but was determined to accelerate my pace and finish strong through the last mile.

I managed to get the win and also dip under nineteen minutes, beating my time last year on this course by around forty seconds. Our girls team also won first place, which we were very excited about because there were some high-caliber teams we competed with at the race.

Next week we have another fairly local meet at the Lemon Bay Invitational, and I am already looking forward to Pre-States in a couple weeks! I wish everybody the best of luck for the coming week and for the remainder of the season!

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My PR's:

1600 - 5:25.23

3200 - 11:23.84

5K - 18:40