When Greg Garzon became head coach of the St. Ed’s cross country program two years ago, he went on a recruiting binge to build up interest in the sport. With that accomplished, a shift is now underway to raise the bar in postseason competition.
“We have a roster of 49, but I have 42 runners that I can count on consistently,” Garzon said. “The other seven are involved in other sports and use cross country exclusively for cross-training.”
Those are some hefty numbers. The casual observer might notice some of the 25 boys and 17 girls pounding the sidewalk pavement along A1A after school. Or you might even find a few training before dawn on Tuesday and Thursday morning.
Garzon says the boys and girls teams are at different levels of development. “The girls team is very young, with the majority in ninth or 10th grade. It started out as a social thing and that was good in terms of getting some of the girls to at least come out for the team. From there it just kind of built on itself.
“They are getting more experience and their times are improving. They are getting stronger and learning more about running and how to be effective in meets. They are doing well and we are looking for them to advance to at least the regional level next year.
“The guys team is a little more established. More than half of the runners from last year are back. The established guys see the benefits of running, being successful in meets and winning. They also know how much fun it can be. The boys team has more depth and more talent than it did at any time over the past two years.
“The boys team should be able to advance to the regionals. Looking at the times from the other schools and where we have been placing in our recent meets, there is a greater than 50 percent chance that we will advance to the state meet in Tallahassee.
“We are keeping our fingers crossed. The team is strong and we are healthy, so we are looking at states as a decent probability. That would be the first time in school history that we have been able to advance that far as a team.”
Seven boys are eligible to represent St. Ed’s in the postseason 5K races. The likely candidates to fill those slots are Allan Ross, Will Sternberg, Zach Alerte, Thomas Bockhorst, Tomas Botero, Michael Burke and Kyle Marshall. Ross is likely to qualify for states as an individual.
Avery Gerber, Teana Tee, Elizabeth Zoltak, Kylie Oakes and Olivia Lazorik are expected to do well for the girls at the district meet.
“This is my first year running cross country and everything panned out the way I thought it would,” Gerber said. “It was definitely tough at first, especially coming back from the summer break.
“But when you are running with your friends, everyone is encouraging you to keep going. That just makes you want to push yourself harder so you can do your best. It was also a good way to meet new people and get in shape for the soccer season.”
This is the fourth year on the cross country team for Teana Tee. She told us, “I’m an avid runner and I’m there every day for practice. Running is a good thing to have in your everyday life. It’s a good way to stay in shape and it’s something everyone can do.”
On training days Tee says the girls will do about 4.5 miles. The boys striving for a run at states will stretch that out.
“A lot of times Allan (Ross) and I will run 5 miles during practice and sometimes a little bit more,” Sternberg said. “That helps us build up for race day.
“This is my first year as part of the varsity cross country team. I always enjoyed running on my own but I wasn’t very competitive about it. Before this I ran a couple of 5K races for charity or local events. Soccer is my main sport, but I actually like running so I decided to do cross country for my fall sport.”
Ross has his eyes on Tallahassee. He said, “My best time was 17:35 last year. I expect to make it to states this season. We have a really good team. This is my third year as a cross country runner. I started doing it just for conditioning (he also swims and plays soccer) and it turned into quite a competitive thing for me.
“I’ve had a lot of fun with it over the last couple of years. I just hope for the best.”