MVXC competed at the Mariner XC Invitational in Hayward, California for the first time and gave the meet a 5-star rating. The meet was well-run, had lots of good energy and the combination led to some fantastic individual performances!
I’m not going to bury the lede. The highlight of the meet from this coach’s view is a whopping 26 new three-mile personal records set by MVXC runners. More than half our team ran new best times! This amazing result is a tribute to a lot of hard work over the course of the season. Every individual should be proud, and every team member should be proud of them. It doesn’t matter what your PR is, the important thing is that you set a new one. The distance we travel is more important than where we end up.
Three Mile Distance PRs At Mariner
| Name | PR |
| Abhi Kotari | 25:05 |
| Aidan Cushman-Kihnley | 19:45 |
| Anika Bhandarkar | 18:56 |
| Brandon Wang | 21:24 |
| Cameron Polidoro | 20:54 |
| Darren Lin | 18:53 |
| Elina Jalili | 27:01 |
| Ethan Yang | 19:16 |
| Isaac Yan | 21:36 |
| Juliana Banes | 27:23 |
| Katherine Lee | 22:20 |
| Katie Li | 24:20 |
| Madison Polidoro | 21:13 |
| Margarita Bondar | 23:35 |
| Nicholas Pantino | 21:12 |
| Parmarth Joshi | 20:37 |
| Qi Huang | 20:24 |
| Rishi Salvi | 17:57 |
| Ruhaan Shah | 18:19 |
| Ryan Liu | 17:36 |
| Simha Satoor | 19:42 |
| Siran Gao | 26:00 |
| Soham Beesetti | 18:21 |
| Sridhar Shivashankar | 21:25 |
| Tanay Parikh | 15:44 |
| Valerie Ayzenberg | 20:47 |
These performances gave us some nice team results. The varsity boys took 15th place out of 36 teams, with Tanay powering home in third place. The frosh-soph boys were 14th; this finish is more impressive when we consider that Rishi and Soham are running varsity and Kento was not at the race. Our young boys have a bright future in front of them! Paru had a flying finish that impressed the entire team…you really had to be there to appreciate it.
The varsity girls nabbed 6th out of 27 teams, with Anika and Miranda earning medals, while the JV girls finished in 14th.
Here is what I hope you are all feeling: I hope you feel like you are peaking. I hope you feel like you are strong and capable. I hope you feel like you have come a long way since that first practice on August 4! Remember when running Matadors’ was a long day? Now Matadors is a maintenance day or even a long shakeout run. You have all traveled a long, long way this past season. Even if you did not run a DPR at Mariner, that is OK…you have been running with your teammates all season long, and so you have improved too. Those miles are inside you and they want to come out! Unless all your fitness at the Lynbrook and SCVAL meets.
Full results are at XCstats.
Next up, Lynbrook!
