Cross country team off to the races
Walden Sullivan, Staff Writer
Fall sports are coming into full swing, and the Samo cross country team plans to make great strides this season. This season the boys’ co-captains are Kai Sloan (’22), who has been on the cross country team since freshman year, and Joey Hoover (’22), who started cross country as a sophomore. The girls’ co-captains are Kim Hansen (’22), who’s been running for fun since she was in middle school and Stephanie Garcia Pliego (’22), who has been on cross country since freshman year. Sloan speaks to the team’s goals for the season.
“Our goal is to win CIF,” Sloan said.
Sloan particularly highlighted Hoover and Colin McCormick (’23), believing they would perform well this season. However, he thinks that the team as a whole would be successful.
There have only been three meets so far this season, but the team is already on the track to success. So far, they have participated in Coolbreeze Invitational, Woodbridge Cross Country Classic and Dana Hills Invitational. The boys’ and girls’ team placed fourth at Woodbridge Classic, with a notable performance from Hoover who was seventh out of 144 runners. The boys ran division II at Dana Hills, where they placed fifth overall and then placed fifteenth overall at the Coolbreeze Invitational. The girls’ placed tenth at Coolbreeze and second at Dana Hills. Hansen asserted herself as a star runner this season, ranking 32nd out of 150 runners at Coolbreeze.
The Cross Country team will compete in their first league meet on Oct. 14 and is looking forward to a successful season.
Nico Lombard/ Contributor