Chicago Regionals Provide Triple Play Action

Josephine Welin led a speedy tour of the accurate Lincoln Park course in record time

Chicago IL-

For some, the day started before the sun came up, and they were greeted with less than ideal conditions for a cross country meet. As time wore on, things began to heat up and it was time for some cross country action!

Beautiful Lincoln Park near the lakefront and the massive skyscrapers provided a bone-chilling backdrop that is rare to this sport. Perhaps it was an extra motivation for those in attendance to cheer on and for the runners themselves to steamroll their way to some great performances.

Class A-

The first race of the day was the girls and it was a two-team battle between Depaul College Prep and Chicago U High. The Maroons of U High struck gold with previous all-stater Amanda O'Donnell who won comfortably in 19:45. Her team would cruise to victory by tallying 28 points. 

The boy's flights would follow the girls and #5 Chicago Latin was the heavy favorite. The Romans have an aggressive three-man attack featuring Ryan Hardiman (Jr.), Akili Parekh (So.), and Peter Bernhardt (Sr.). They would concede the individual race to Chicago U High's Nicky Edwards-Levin and his solid 15:29. Latin went 2,3 and 4. The scoring spread overall was 1:34.

Advancing teams: Latin 25, Depaul Prep 58, Chicago U High 91, Northshore Country Day 108, Chicago Wolcott 169

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2A-

The betting odds coming was what would #1 Chicago Latin do. Could they sweep the top five spots with top-rated Ava Parekh (Jr.) and Marianne Mihas (Sr.) leading the charge?

As expected Parekh set the tone with a modest advantage on the field. Things would later expand to over 20 seconds through the second mile in flight #1. Mihas paced with teammate Olivia Syftestad (Sr.) throughout the affair. If they could stay within 30 seconds of Parekh, things would be incredibly favorable for the Romans.

Parekh streamed home on the new layout in 17:25 and just over 30 seconds ahead of Mihas (18:01) and Syftestad (18:03). Lexi Affolter (Sr., St. Ignatius) broke up the sweep by taking fourth in 18:39. Mckenna Fellows (Jr.) won the second flight in 19:15 to solidify things for her team going forward. 

There wasn't much to talk about on the boy's side of the ledger. The fourth-ranked St. Ignatius pulled off a rare "Blitzkreig" by taking all seven spots over two flights.

In the first flight which featured a team's top three runners, the Wolfpack deployed junior twins Zack Kiley and Nick Kiley. After a conservative first mile in 5:17, the twins picked up the pace and pushed themselves to 15:54 and 15:55 stakes. Needless to say, St. Ignatius scored 15 points. Payton took second with 58 points followed by Solorio Academy 83.

Class 3A

Teams in the mighty West Suburban Silver Conference have endured some criticism and notoriety based on not running on many regulation courses this season. However, starting with the girls, #7 Oak Park-River Forest came in as a heavy favorite and on a mission to prove they good. 

OPR junior Josephine Welin, who is finally coming into her own after a tremendous Covid-19 off-season racing season the track. Welin busted out to a 5:29 first mile which had many of those in attendance buzzing. The second-place runner was 5:50.

Typically, runners slow down significantly in the second mile. Welin kept the tempo and pressure, hitting 11:14 on the clock and it appeared at that moment that a sub 17:00 time would be in the cards.

Welin blazed home in a park record 16:55- about 30 seconds faster than what Parekh earlier in the day. No one remotely thought it was possible. Unfortunately, these two titans will not get an opportunity to compete against each other. The Huskies scored 25 points to easily outdistance themselves from Lane Tech 25-64. Jones College Prep was third with 70 points. 

The boys' side was not expected to be much better in terms of competition with #7 Jones College Prep in the field. The Eagles rolled out senior Andy Niser who set a very fast pace which stretched the field out. The first mile was several shades under 5:00. The Eagles trio along with Oak Park-River Park's group were all together. Ultimately, and as predicted Aaron Hou (Sr.) ran down his teammate Niser to win in 15:25. Niser clocked 15:31. Jones used a strong second flight to easily pull away for the 20 point win.