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- Senior Jesse Tripathi and sophomore Rafi Razzaque run against Wellesley at Cold Spring Park Wednesday.
by Gloria Li
Despite the muddy grounds due to heavy rains the previous evening, boys’ cross country managed to defeat Wellesley, Wednesday 24 to 32.
The conditions caused a cross country member, freshman Vinnie Amatucci to lose his shoes during the race.
According to Amatucci, he continued to run, and managed to keep going for an entire loop in the course without his shoes because they got stuck in the mud during the competition.
“They fell off, but I had to run, so I kept going,” Amatucci said.
Senior Daniel Buzby, a captain with senior Justin Keefe said, “The muddy course messed up peoples’ speed a bit, but we just set our own pace. I’m not the fastest, but I always go until I die and put in my all.”
Junior Cris Wren said, “The course is always rocky and dangerous too.”
Coach Jim Blackburn said, “I think we won comfortably, we weren’t as good against them in the past as we were today.”
According to Keefe, “We won last year against Wellesley, but this one really competitive kid came out of nowhere at that meet and took first place when we ran against them on their home course. We’ve improved since.”
The improvement was dramatic with Keefe taking first overall and on the team with a time of 16:13.
Sophomore Gabe Montague placed second with 17:09 and an athlete from Wellesley following close behind him.
Sophomore Mike Schlicting came in sixth overall and third on the team with 17:25.
Behind him was Junior Jonny Long who came in seventh overall but fourth on the team with 17:35.
Thereafter, Junior David Demarest placed eighth overall and fifth on the team with 17:48.
Blackburn said, “I think that it would have been better to have a meet like this in the beginning since the other courses were too short. All the big meets will be of this length, so it’s a more accurate measure of how our team will do later on.”