Yesterday, on a sunny and unseasonably warm afternoon, the Seton boys and girls state cross country teams competed in the 2023 VISAA Championship Meet on the hilly and challenging 5K course at Woodberry Forest School.  Here are the highlights: Seton boys finished 5th out of 16 scoring teams, their highest finish since placing 5th in 2011.   Seton girls finished 9th out of 12 scoring teams, despite being without their #2 runner who was lost to injury earlier in the week. Michael Brand and Rose Waldron both made the All-State teams with matching 17th place finishes.  They are our first All-State runners since 2015, when Greg Jackson and Geni Lucas accomplished the feat. Several runners bettered their time on the Woodberry Forest course from when we ran there in September, most notably Kieran Kelly (46 second drop), Rose Waldron (44 second drop) and Jerome Kramer (27 second drop),  Also dropping time were Patrick Gross (12 seconds) and Michael Brand (11 seconds). All of the runners gave a great effort on Thursday, some going above and beyond (you know who you are!)  and are looking forward to even greater success next year! This brings to an end a very successful cross country season.  We accomplished much this year, and will celebrate our efforts at the Cross Country end-of-season banquet. Results can be seen HERE.  

On Wednesday, we went once again to Burke Lake Park for our Conference Championship Meet and what an amazing performance in our last meet with the entire team!   The *average* time drop for all our runners from the previous race at Burke Lake in October was over a minute and a half! (97.8 seconds, to be exact!)   This is a testament to all the hard work and many long runs, hill repeats and quarters that you have done.  Coach Gross estimated that you all have put in at least 350-400 miles since the start of the season!    Leading the way with biggest time drops were, for Middle School runners, John Paul with a drop of almost 6 minutes and Chiara with a drop of 4:27.  For the high schoolers, Noah (4:29), Ben (4:03) and Andrew (2:59) had the biggest drops for the boys, while Colette (2:20) and Cora (1:32) had the biggest improvements for the girls.  Among the notable improvements for the varsity runners were: Dan (2:22), Patrick K (1:34), Monica (1:21) and Max (1:12).  Also dropping by more than a minute were Lily, Penny, Nick, Gabriel and Robert.  We had an astounding 27 Personal Best times set on Wednesday! Michael Brand earned All-Conference honors, placing 10th with a team best time of 17:16.31.  Following close behind were Jerome Kramer (18th) and Dan Jackson (22nd), with all three of those under 18 minutes.  That is the first time we have had 3 runners under 18 in a VCAC conference meet.  Rose Waldron was the top Seton girl, placing 15th with a time of 21:29.70, followed by Lily Griffin and Penny Kramer.  Patrick Kay had an exceptional race, dropping a minute and a half from his previous PR to finish as the seventh Seton runner, earning the final spot on the VISAA State meet team.  Peter Russo was recognized as a top finisher for the Middle School race, finishing 12th with a time of 22:45.20.   Here is the link to the milestat results, and a summary of the statistics: https://va.milesplit.com/meets/579208-vcac-championship-2023/results Athlete Time   Note Drop from previous time at Burke Lake, Oct 3 Rose Waldron 21:29.70   Personal Best, 15th place 0:51.6 Lily Griffin 22:23.26   Season Best 1:03.2 Penny Kramer 23:48.27   Personal Best 1:00.3 Monica Hartung 23:52.92     1:21.1 Mary Catherine Munsell 25:18.21     0:31.7 Philomena Kay 26:29.99   Personal Best   Cora Kramer 26:35.61   Personal Best 1:32.5 Noemi Rodriguez 27:27.95   Personal Best   Colette Kramer 29:11.41   Personal Best 2:20.5 Chiara Ghering 31:52.16   Personal Best 4:27.3           Michael Brand 17:16.31   Personal Best, 10th place 0:42.6 Jerome Kramer 17:41.94   Personal Best, 18th place 0:42.9 Daniel Jackson 17:49.37   Personal Best 2:21.8 Peter Konstanty 18:17.85   Personal Best 0:51.7 Patrick Gross 18:19.84     0:12.3 Max Wilson 18:35.53   Personal Best 1:12.4 Patrick Kay 19:10.73   Personal Best 1:34.2 Joseph Dwane 19:21.70   Personal Best   Kieran Kelly 20:06.79   Personal Best 0:36.9 Christian Ghering 20:41.76     0:40.7 Nick Vaughan 21:03.59   Personal Best 1:17.7 Michael Brox 21:04.57       Noah Vaughan 21:10.67   Personal Best 4:29.0 Gabriel Dwane 21:20.22   Personal Best 1:05.7 Peter Hartung 22:11.75   Personal Best 2:08.2 Luke Griffin 22:29.86   Personal Best   Ben Ellis 23:14.51   Personal Best 4:03.5 Andrew Ghering 24:32.68   Personal Best 2:58.7 Peter Russo 22:45.30   Personal Best, 12th place (MS) 0:12.8 Robert Chiappetta 23:30.80   Personal Best 1:42.0 Grayson Shambaugh 23:43.92   Personal Best 0:24.9 Joey Lynch 24:04.68   Personal Best 0:54.7 John Paul Hartung 27:54.45   Personal Best 5:58.6 The team for the VISAA state meet was finalized after the meet, as Patrick K earned the final spot on the boys team.  We were blessed with a wealth of fast runners this year, with every one of our active high school runners meeting the minimum time thresholds of 25 minutes for boys and 30 minutes for girls.  We are restricted to only 10 runners per gender for the state meet, though, and competition for those ten spots on the boys team was very intense.  In the end, we are taking a team of ten runners, nine of whom have personal best times under 20 minutes, with 6 of those under 19 minutes and 3 of those under 18 minutes!  This is probably the deepest team that we have ever sent to the state meet.   Here are the runners who will represent Seton School at the 2023 VISAA Cross Country State Championship: Girls: Lily Griffin, Sr (Captain) Rose Waldron, Jr Monica Hartung, Soph Mary Catherine Munsell, Soph Colette Kramer, Soph Penny Kramer, Fr Philomena Kay, Fr Cora Kramer, Fr Noemi Rodriguez, Fr Boys: Peter Konstanty, Sr (Co-Captain) Patrick Gross, Soph (Co-Captain) Joseph Dwane, Sr Jerome Kramer, Jr Max Wilson, Jr Michael Brox, Jr Kieran Kelly, Jr Michael Brand, Soph Daniel Jackson, Fr Patrick Kay, 8th   To all the athletes, I thank you for letting me be part of your season and congratulate you all for your efforts, endurance and accomplishments!   Coach Konstanty

Today was the Virginia Catholic State Championship Meet, featuring teams from 12 Catholic schools from around the state, ranging in size from large schools like Bishop O'Connell and Pope Paul VI to small schools like Walsingham and Roanoke Catholic.  On the boys side, St John Paul the Great dominated, winning over Catholic High School of Virginia Beach by 78 points, while Saint Sebastian Academy repeated as girls champs, pulling out a 9 point win over Bishop Ireton.  Seton boys improved on their finish from last year, moving up from 8th to 4th, while the girls dropped one spot from 8th last year to 9th this year. For the boys, Michael Brand was recognized at the awards ceremony, finishing 13th with a time of 18:17.  Patrick Gross also broke 19 minutes, finishing in 23rd place at 18:55.  As has been the case all season, our 3rd through 6th runners finished in a pretty tight pack, with Max Wilson (19:22), Dan Jackson (19:25), Jerome Kramer (19:43) and Peter Konstanty (19:53) coming in within 31 seconds.  Our 1st-to-5th split (the time between our team's first runner and our fifth runner) was 1 minute 26 seconds, which was the best split for the boys competition.  This helped us score 137 points, tied with Paul VI,  Because of the way cross country is scored, getting your 4th, 5th and even 6th and 7th runners in before other teams get their 3rd, 4th or 5th can really help your team score.  Even though he did not score, our sixth place runner, Peter Konstanty, placed ahead of Paul VI's 6th place runner, which gave us the tiebreaker to claim 4th place.   Not only that, but Peter placed above Paul VI's 4th and 5th place runners, which caused those Paul VI runners' scores to be one point higher.   For the girls, Lily Griffin and Rose Waldron led the way with times of 24:25 and 24:28, respectively. Here are the Seton results: Lily Griffin 24:25 Rose Waldron 24:28 Monica Hartung 25:37 Penny Kramer 27:00 Mary Catherine Munsell 28:22 Philomena Kay 28:37 Cora Kramer 28:37 Noemi Rodriguez 28:39 Colette Kramer 32:33     Michael Brand 18:17 Patrick Gross 18:55 Max Wilson 19:22 Dan Jackson 19:25 Jerome Kramer 19:43 Peter Konstanty 19:53 Joseph Dwane 20:58 Patrick Kay 21:07 Kieran Kelly 21:37 Michael Brox 22:00 C J Ghering 22:57 Gabriel Dwane 23:29 Peter Hartung 23:44 Ben Ellis 24:02 Nick Vaughan 24:25 Joey Lynch 25:51   Only one personal best - Ben Ellis - on this course, which was not as hilly as some others but quite challenging.   Here is the breakdown of the boys vs Paul VI for 4th place: Score   Runner Team   Place for team Time 5   Logan Beale Paul VI   1st 17:26 13   Michael Brand Seton School   1st 18:17 19   Chase Garcia Paul VI   2nd 18:44 23   Patrick Gross Seton School   2nd 18:55 30   Ryan Maso Paul VI   3rd 19:21 32   Max Wilson Seton School   3rd 19:22 33   Daniel Jackson Seton School   4th 19:25 36   Jerome Kramer Seton School   5th 19:43 39   Peter Konstanty Seton School   6th 19:53 41   Alex Fromm Paul VI   4th 19:57 42   Brian Revor Paul VI   5th 20:00 51   Vinny Kiernan Paul VI   6th 20:21 52   Stephen Schafer Paul VI   7th 20:23 61   Joseph Dwane Seton School   7th 20:58               Seton   137 *   = 13 + 23 + 32 + 33 + 36 (39) (61)   Paul VI    137       = 5 + 19 + 30 + 41 + 42  (51 ) (52)    *  Seton wins tiebreaker because of 6th place runners   For the girls, Monica and Noemi bettered their time on this course from last year.  Our five-person girls varsity team finished ninth, with Lily, Rose and Monica leading the way followed by Penny Penny and Mary Catherine. In the JV race, Philomena and Cora finished together, with Noemi just a few steps behind, followed by Colette. For the boys, Joseph Dwane was our 7th runner in.  Patrick Kay did well in the JV race, placing 14th and getting the 8th best time for a Seton boy, beating out Kieran, Michael Brox and CJ.  Gabriel Dwane and Peter Hartung also bettered their time on this course from last year.  Nick and Joey finished strong, after taking on the difficult Occoquan course.

After running on the mountains of the Blue Ridge for the past two Saturdays, we returned to the flatlands of Leesylvania State Park for the third and final regular season conference meet.  This meet was amazingly fast, as 21 of our runners had their personal best and another 3 had season bests.  However, our rivals also showed great improvement and we had the same team results: boys in third, girls in sixth.     For the boys, Michael Brand took a top ten finish at 9th place with a personal best time of 17:39.  Jerome Kramer was the 2nd Seton finisher, at a personal best of 18:05, followed by Max Wilson, whose 18:36 was almost a minute faster than his previous best.  Dan Jackson and Peter Konstanty were next in, both breaking the 19 minute barrier for the first time also at 18:42 and 18:48, respectively.  Rounding out the top seven were Patrick Gross, gamely fighting through an asthma attack while finishing in 18:59, and Joseph Dwane, rounding into form after missing much of the season with an ankle injury.   In the competition for the final 3 spots on the ten-man state team, Michael Brox tightened his hold on the number 8 spot with a solid 20:09, while CJ Ghering and Kieran Kelly had a photo finish, with matching personal best times 20:19.  So 11th place runner Patrick Kay (PR 20:42) has some ground to make up to try to move ahead of those two.   For the girls, Rose Waldron did a personal best of 21:50 while finishing 12th.  After Lily Griffin did a season best 22:58,   Monica Hartung and Penny Kramer finished with PR's of 23:36 and 23:58, and Mary Catherine Munsell rounded out the top five at 25:06.  Philomena Kay had a season best, and Cora Kramer, Noemi Rodriguez and Colette Kramer had personal bests, with Colette breaking 30 minutes for the first time!   Results: Link: https://va.milesplit.com/meets/567282-vcac-meet-3-2023/results   ATHLETE TIME   NOTES         Rose Waldron 21:50   Personal Best Lily Griffin 22:58   Season Best Monica Hartung 23:36   Personal Best Penny Kramer 23:58   Personal Best Mary Catherine Munsell 25:06     Philomena Kay 26:42   Season Best Cora Kramer 26:46   Personal Best Noemi Rodriguez 27:39   Personal Best Colette Kramer 29:54   Personal Best         Michael Brand 17:39   Personal Best Jerome Kramer 18:05   Personal Best Max Wilson 18:36   Personal Best Daniel Jackson 18:42   Personal Best Peter Konstanty 18:48   Personal Best Patrick Gross 18:59     Joseph Dwane 19:57   Season Best Michael Brox 20:09     Christian Ghering 20:19   Personal Best Kieran Kelly 20:19   Personal Best Patrick Kay 20:42   Personal Best Nick Vaughan 21:32   Personal Best John Karcher 21:35     Gabriel Dwane 22:22   Personal Best Peter Hartung 22:40   Personal Best Luke Griffin 23:08   Personal Best Noah Vaughan 24:41     Joey Lynch 24:41   Personal Best Andrew Ghering 25:36   Personal Best Ben Ellis 25:37

For the second week in a row, we ventured out west to run in the country, this time in Waynesboro VA at the Grace Christian Invitational. We ran well on a wet and hilly course. Our girls finished in a tie for third with Eastern Mennonite School, but EMS was awarded 3rd because of the sixth place runner - their sixth was one place ahead of ours.   Then our boys finished third, by a single point, to Eastern Mennonite (again!).   More on that below. We had a couple of top ten finishers: Rose Waldron (10th) for girls, Michael Brand (4th) and Patrick Gross (9th) for boys.  There were a couple of personal bests: Daniel Jackson, Max Wilson, Nick Vaughan and Colette Kramer.  In addition, three of our sevvie boys ran the middle school 2 mile, with Peter Russo coming in at 14:30.7, Greyson Shambaugh at 14:49 ( a drop of over 2 minutes from his time in September) and Robert Chiappetta at 15:14.7.   About that third place finish for our boys...  after the boys won the Generals Invitational the previous week by having our 1st through 5th runners finishing in only a 41 second span, we lost out on a second place trophy to Eastern Mennonite when they turned the tables on us by bunching their first through fifth tighter than we did: PLACE Last Team Time Score 4 Brand Seton 18:06.6 4 8 Ott Eastern Mennonite 18:22.5 7 9 Gross Seton 18:27.9 8 11 Holland Eastern Mennonite 18:48.1 10 12 Sneary Eastern Mennonite 18:53.1 11 14 Castaneda Eastern Mennonite 18:54.7 13 15 Jackson Seton 18:56.0 14 16 Kramer Seton 18:56.8 15 20 Bixler Eastern Mennonite 19:16.6 18 21 Wilson Seton 19:17.6 19           Eastern Mennonite       59  = 7 + 10 + 11 + 13 + 18         0:54 1-5 split Seton                               60 = 4  +  8  + 14 + 15 + 19         1:11 1-5 split     Results Link to Milesplit: https://va.milesplit.com/meets/562190-grace-christian-staunton-invitational-2023/results   GIRLS HIGH SCHOOL 5K RUN TIME PLACE   NOTES Rose Waldron 23:24.0 10th     Lily Griffin 24:55.5 15th     Penny Kramer 25:42.5 20th     Mary Catherine Munsell 27:29.2 26th     Cora Kramer 28:21.2 32nd     Colette Kramer 31:26.8 38th   Personal Best Noemi Rodriguez 33:38.4 42nd               BOYS HIGH SCHOOL 5K RUN TIME PLACE   NOTES Michael Brand 18:06.6 4th     Patrick Gross 18:27.9 9th     Daniel Jackson 18:56.0 15th   Personal Best Jerome Kramer 18:56.8 16th     Max Wilson 19:17.6 21st   Personal Best Peter Konstanty 19:27.9 24th     Joseph Dwane 20:24.4 35th   Season Best Patrick Kay 20:57.3 44th     Kieran Kelly 21:37.0 50th     Christian Ghering 21:42.5 52nd     Noah Vaughan 21:44.3 53rd     John Karcher 21:49.6 55th     Michael Brox 22:09.7 58th     Nick Vaughan 22:20.4 60th   Personal Best Gabriel Dwane 22:47.1 66th     Luke Griffin 24:16.8 75th               MIDDLE SCHOOL 2 MILE RUN TIME PLACE   NOTES Peter Russo 14:30.7 25th   Personal Best Grayson Shambaugh 14:49.0 27th   Personal Best Robert Chiappetta 15:14.7 31st   Personal Best  

After a cool, foggy and drizzly start, the clouds broke up and we had a glorious sunny morning for our cross country meet at the New Market Battlefield.  The New Market course is quite the challenge, as the hills are not steep, but the inclines are long and numerous.  No personal or season bests were gotten on Saturday, but all 7 runners who had run here before in 2021 bettered their time.   Our varsity girls started first with Rose Waldron beating her previous time at New Market by over two minutes.  Rose finished 15th in the small school division.  Monica Hartung also beat her prior time at New Market by over a minute, while Penny Kramer won the Kramer sister competition.   The varsity boys ran in a pretty tight pack, with our first five runners crossing the finish line within a span of only 41 seconds!   Michael Brand led the way with an 8th place finish in the small school division, while Patrick Gross, Daniel Jackson, Peter Konstanty and Jerome Kramer finished in quick succession in places 15 through 18.  That meant that our fifth scoring runner came in before most teams had their third runner in!  When the final results were calculated, our depth brought us a first place in the small school division by 4 points!  Max Wilson and Kieran Kelly also placed as our sixth and seventh runners.  Joe Dwane finally overcame his injury bug and ran his first race of the season, running under his time from 2021 at this course, while Michael Brox dropped two and a half minutes off from his 2021 New Market time!  John Karcher also came back from injury to be our tenth varsity runner for this race, but has to watch out for the competition for that spot from the JV runners...   Speaking of JV runners, Patrick Kay placed 4th in the JV boys race, small school division, with a time of 22:23, which would have put him as our 8th varsity runner.  He has displaced John in the top ten, as competition for the last couple of spots on the state team is really heating up!  Also in the running, no pun intended, is Christian Ghering, who placed 7th in the JV race, 30 seconds behind Patrick and 15 seconds ahead of John Karcher's time in the varsity race.  Gabriel Dwane placed 12th and Peter Hartung 14th in the JV race, while Luke Griffin looked strong and relaxed as he ran his first race of the season.  JV runners Joey Lynch, Andrew Ghering, Ben Ellis, Cora Kramer and Colette Kramer also conquered the New Market course, which most runners agreed was the toughest so far this year.    Here are the results: Generals Invitational Meet - Results adjusted for group placement Level Athlete Time   Place               Varsity Girls WALDRON, Rose 24:13.6 * 15     HARTUNG, Monica 26:01.6 * 30     KRAMER, Penny 27:47.4   40   JV Girls KRAMER, Cora 30:15.3   6     KRAMER, Colette 34:22.2   9               Varsity Boys BRAND, Michael 19:30.9   8     GROSS, Patrick 19:50.0 * 15     JACKSON, Daniel 20:00.4   16     KONSTANTY, Peter 20:06.9 * 17     KRAMER, Jerome 20:12.0 * 18     WILSON, Max 21:31.1   32     KELLY, Kieran 22:12.3   42     DWANE, Joseph 22:47.9 * 50     BROX, Michael 22:48.3 * 51     KARCHER, John 23:10.5   56   JV Boys KAY, Patrick 22:23.7   4     GHERING, Christian 22:54.3   7     DWANE, Gabriel 24:13.0   12     HARTUNG, Peter 25:23.4   14     GRIFFIN, Luke 25:50.4   16     LYNCH, Joey 26:37.6   18     GHERING, Andrew 26:40.9   19     ELLIS, Ben 27:47.8   21   * ran faster time than they did on this course in 2021         And here is the breakdown on how we defeated the second place team from Fort Defiance HS: Place Athlete Team Score Time 4 BLOSSER Fort Defiance 3 18:31.8 7 SCHULZ Fort Defiance 6 19:16.0 8 BRAND Seton School 7 19:30.9 15 GROSS Seton School 12 19:50.0 16 JACKSON Seton School 13 20:00.4 17 KONSTANTY Seton School 14 20:06.9 18 KRAMER Seton School 15 20:12.0 19 MITCHELL Fort Defiance 16 20:16.1 22 WRIGHT Fort Defiance 19 20:34.2 24 SOMMERFIELD Fort Defiance 20:52.9 Score differs from Place because runners from teams that did not  have enough to score (5 runners min) were excluded from the score.   Seton:   7 + 12 + 13 + 14 + 15 = 61 Fort Defiance: 3 + 6 + 16 + 19 + 21 = 65 Link to Results: https://va.milesplit.com/meets/561584-25th-annual-generals-xc-invitational-2023  

Here are the results from Tuesday's VCAC Meet #2 at Burke Lake:https://va.milesplit.com/meets/573055-vcac-meet-2-2023/results   Burke Lake is a challenging 3 mile course with a lot of elevation change.  Our runners did well, with 10 personal bests, 3 more season bests, as well as 5 experienced runners who did their best time ever at this course.  In addition, our sevvies ran their first 5K race as Seton runners, with Peter Russo getting a top 5 finish in the middle school boys race!  For the girls, Rose Waldron ran very well and placed in the top 12, as did Michael Brand for the boys.   As a team, the results were a repeat of the Leesylvania race, as we are running against the two time defending Division 2 champion )Trinity) and the likely Division 1 champion (John Paul).  Having this level of competition will make us better!     GIRLS Time   Place Notes Rose Waldron 22:21.3   12th Season Best Lily Griffin 23:26.5   18th Season Best Penny Kramer 24:48.6   40th   Monica Hartung 25:14.0   46th Season Best Mary Catherine Munsell 25:49.9   49th   Cora Kramer 28:08.2   63rd Personal Best Colette Kramer 31:31.9   79th Personal Best           BOYS Time   Place Notes Michael Brand 17:58.9   12th Personal Best Jerome Kramer 18:24.9   15th Personal Best Patrick Gross 18:32.1   18th PB at Burke Lake Peter Konstanty 19:09.5   21st PB at Burke Lake Max Wilson 19:47.9   28th   Daniel Jackson 20:11.1   31st PB at Burke Lake Kieran Kelly 20:43.6   39th Personal Best Patrick Kay 20:45.0   40th Personal Best Michael Brox 21:01.5   44th PB at Burke Lake Christian Ghering 21:22.5   48th   Nick Vaughan 22:21.3   55th Personal Best Gabriel Dwane 22:25.9   57th Personal Best Peter Hartung 24:19.9   66th PB at Burke Lake Noah Vaughan 25:39.6   70th   Ben Ellis 27:18.0   72nd   Andrew Ghering 27:31.4   73rd Personal Best           MIDDLE SCHOOL BOYS Time   Place Notes Peter Russo  22:58.13    4th Fourth place in MS Boys! 1st 5K this year Grayson Shambaugh  24:08.87    10th First 5K this season Joey Lynch  24:59.34    12th Personal Best Robert Chiappetta 25:12.76   14th    First 5K this season John Paul Hartung 33:53.08 26th     First 5K this season MIDDLE SCHOOL GIRLS                           Time     Place      Notes Chiara Ghering 36:19.45 33rd    First 5K this season

The coaches entered the team in the Woodberry Forest Invitational with the idea that we could get experience on the course that the VISAA State Meet will be on, and, well... it was quite an experience!   First, there was a traffic jam on the way to the meet that delayed our arrival, especially for half the girls' team.  Then there were various trips, slips, falls and other mishaps, including one that sent one of our runners to the medical tent with a spike to the knee - don't let anyone tell you that Cross Country is not a physical contact sport!  But, in the end, we ran well and did have a great experience!   To recap the results... in general, times were slower than the Tuesday meet, but this was a very hilly and challenging course, and the competition included several large public schools and many of the top schools in the independent VISAA divisions.     Our girls started off the meet at 4pm, which was 14 minutes after the arrival of half the varsity team.  Their warmup was to get on their race number and run to the start line.  But they all did pretty well, and gained great experience on the course that will be invaluable at the State Meet in November.   Girls team results: Rose 24:13.7 Lily 24:56.6 Monica 25:50.6 Mary Catherine 25:58.8 Penny 26:46.9 Philomena 27:22.5 Cora 29:54.0 Noemi 30:29.5 Colette 33:20.7   Next, the boys team set off and almost immediately ran into difficulties as someone clipped the back of Patrick G's shoe, taking it off.  Then there was a fall and pileup in which Christian was spiked in the knee.  Later Gabriel D collided with another runner and took a tumble.  Despite all that we managed to place ahead of a couple of teams that were above us at last year's state meet.  We had 4 runners under 20 minutes, and every boy who ran this course at states last year improved on their time.       Here are the boys results: Michael B 19:14.0   Top Seton runner Peter K 19:24.9   Improved over last time on this course by 40 sec Dan 19:25.2   Personal Best, improved on course by 86 sec Patrick G 19:42.3   Improved over last time on this course by 20 sec Jerome 20:20.9   Improved over last time on this course by 45 sec Max 20:32.3     John 21:44.0     Patrick K 21:53.9   Personal Best Kieran 22:18.7     Christian 23:05.2   despite getting spiked! Nick 23:18.5     Noah 23:24.5     Gabriel D 23:49.4     Peter H 24:28.1     Joey 25:03.5   Personal Best Andrew 26:25.7   Personal Best   We are encouraged by the time improvement and the fact that despite the falls and mishaps we placed above two of the top teams in our division from last year.  As we look forward to returning here for the state meet in November, we will have this experience to draw on to give us the confidence to better our state meet result! https://va.milesplit.com/meets/515785-woodberry-forest-47th-annual-xc-invitational-2023/results https://blueridgetiminglive.com/2023/wbf/index.html

We had a very productive first meet, with 13 runners getting their all-time personal best time, and 8 runners completing their first high school 5K. Our boys finished 3rd behind two strong teams from St John Paul the Great and Trinity Christian, while the girls finished 6th in a very competitive girls event. The boys race was decided by one point, with John Paul winning 27-28 over Trinity. Here is link to the results:https://va.milesplit.com/meets/567275-vcac-meet-1-2023/results   The Seton runners times are below:   Girls Team Time   Notes Rose 23:27   15th place Lily 23:32   16th place Penny 24:12   Personal Best Mary Catherine 25:02     Monica 25:20   Season Best Philomena 26:50   Season Best Cora 28:56   First 5K  Noemi 29:28   Personal Best Colette 31:49   Personal Best         Boys Team Time   Notes Michael Brand 18:16   Personal Best, 12th place Patrick G 18:19   Personal Best, 14th place Jerome 18:35   Personal Best, 15th place Peter K 19:03   Personal Best, 19th place Max 19:32   Personal Best Daniel 19:33   Personal Best Michael Brox 19:58   Personal Best John 20:46   First 5K  Christian 20:52   First 5K  Kieran 21:40   First 5K  Noah 21:43   First 5K  Nick 22:44   First 5K  Gabriel D 23:41   Personal Best Peter H 23:48   Personal Best Joey 25:48   First 5K  Ben 26:02   Personal Best Andrew 27:40   First 5K