Max Bucksbaum Although it’s only a few weeks into the school year, the cross country team has been in full swing, with 4 meets already completed.  The Romans have started the season strong, winning their first meet, which was a relay event with a girl-guy pairing. The team won with half as many points as the second place team (in cross country, the team with the lowest score wins).  The second race was also a relay, this time with each gender in a separate race.  The boys finished second while the girls finished third, a good result, especially with some larger schools running at the meet.  Last Saturday the team ran at Hinsdale, in what was one of the premier races in the entire state, featuring the top six schools from 3A.  While the competition was stiff, the Romans held their own.  The frosh/soph girls race went off first and Latin placed three runners in the top 15 and got third overall, an impressive performance. The Varsity boys also ran well, racing with a tight pack.  This year the top 5 averaged 16:56 for 3 miles while missing the number one runner, and last year the team averaged 17:37 while missing their second best runner. Dropping 40 seconds off the average is certainly something to be proud of. The Varsity girls also ran well with Abigail Nadler leading the pack. The team result isn’t very indicative of their performance because they had some of their young Varsity runners in the frosh/soph race.  At this point, the Romans are looking like they will be able to handle the move up to 2A quite well.  The team is heading down to the State course in Peoria this weekend and the results there will be a great indicator of where each team stands amongst its peer schools.  Despite the bump up to 2A, it looks as if both the boys and girls could do some serious damage at State this year.]]>