It's Championship Time!
There are only two meets remaining for the vast majority of NHS XC athletes so it's time to get rested and ready to run fast! The next two races are both at Lake Sammamish State Park.

- This Thursday 10/18 we will be participating in the KingCo 3A Championship.
ALL ATHLETES will participate in this event. Any non-varsity athletes are expected to run in the JV race. Remember, participation in both the Bellevue City and Kingco meets are requirements to get credit for participation this season. This is the last required meet.
Buses will leave school at 12:30. Athletes will be dismissed at 12:20, that is right before second lunch. Athletes who have first lunch will be leaving during 5B. Please get on the bus IMMEDIATELY. You should come to school dressed in your XC gear. We do NOT have time to wait for you to get ready to leave. Go to 5th period with everything you will need and go straight out to the bus. The JV girls will need to get to the park and warm up right away so please respect them. The meet schedule is:
1:00 PM Packets available at finish area
1:30 PM Coaches Meeting at finish area
1:45 PM Volunteers Meeting at finish area (Reminder: we need several Newport parent volunteers to help since we have the largest program in the league)
2:00 PM JV Girls Race
2:45 PM Varsity Girls Race
3:15 PM Varsity Boys Race
3:45 PM JV Boys Race
4:45 PM Awards

- Next Thursday 10/25 is the 3A SeaKing District Championship. Athletes who do not qualify to run in the varsity race have the opportunity to run in the Open Race should they want to take one more shot at a PR. Athletes are not required to run in this meet. The league website still has last year's district schedule up, but I am assuming the meet schedule is as follows:
2:30 Girls' Race
3:15 Boys' Race
4:00 Open Race
4:30 Awards

RACING REPORT: BELLEVUE CITY MEET

BOYS:
The boys had to face an excellent Bellevue team on Wednesday, and although it was a tough day there were some very positive results. Although they were defeated by Bellevue, the boys defeated both Sammamish and Interlake. At the individual level, the coaching staff recognized both Sam Staples and Ethan Moffat for their excellent races. Both ran races that were equivalent to personal bests and were very competitive. In addition to Sam and Ethan there were twelve other boys who ran sub-20 5k races on Wednesday. The entire varsity squad of Neil Baunsgard, Andrew Coover, Jacob Dance, Sam, Neil Walton, Alex Poplawski, and Brent Magnusson, PLUS Michael Hutchins, Alex Bell, Steven Soroka, Josh Glantz, Ryan Steele, Brian Li and Ethan. Chris Choe and Rory Jack came very close. The JV boys look forward to Thursday where they will race against other future varsity guys from around the league.

Also, looking back over time to last year's Bellevue City meet which was actually on a faster course, there is some pretty awesome improvement. Most of the JV boys on the list above ran between 30 seconds to a minute faster than they did last year.

GIRLS:
Unlike the boys, the girls did not have to face a top team this week. However, with the return of one of their top girls and the improvement of their #1 and 2 who are running XC for the first time, the Bellevue girls were much tougher than in the early season. Still, Newport only scored 18 points, leaving us UNDEFEATED in KingCo regular season meets with a maximum score of 18 points. We're very much hoping to continue that streak going into the KingCo Championship meet this week.

At the individual level, the coaching staff recognized Laura Nay and Rachael Sherman for their courageous races and excellent improvement on Wednesday.

Our varsity squad of Jillian Altizer, Emily Albrecht, Christine Dollar, Jillian Raftery, Katrina England, Emily Meyer and Taryn Blache trained very hard this week, and although they looked a little tired they proved just how strong they are. Christine, Katrina, Emily M and Taryn all showed tremendous improvement over last year's Bell-City. In fact, Emily M and Taryn improved by about a minute and a half!
The varsity girls weren't the only ones who showed improvement. In addition to the top 7, 5 other girls broke 24 minutes: Rachel Jiang, Hannah Neibulski, Danielle Seymour, Kelly Toy, and Bryanna Woo. The JV group, which also includes the tight pack of Steffi Terasaki, Mo Villanueva, and Maya Graue who hope to break 24 at KingCo, are looking forward to a very competitive JV Kingco meet on Thursday.