Middletown South’s Girls Cross Country team has gotten off to a great start to the season, boasting an extremely talented and experienced roster. The season kicked off with a booming success in a meet against Manalapan, as South took second to twelfth place at the meet while bringing home the blowout win. Runners Emily Burns, Brianna Haspel, Cassidy Weimer, Christina Caccamo, MaryKate Himmelberg, Gianna Campanale, Bridget Laurence, Christiana Rutkowski, and Sylvie Evarts all came in at or under a time of 22:42, an impressive feat and a rare display of depth unmatched in the shore conference. The girls’ first win of the season is just the beginning of their eventual success both as a team and individually, as they now boast a ranking of fourteenth in the entire shore conference.
Senior Christiana Rutkowski, one of the team’s trusted leaders and four year veterans, is especially excited about the team’s high hopes. Rutkowski said about her team’s thrilling opening, “Our potential for what we are capable of doing is starting to show itself.” With the team’s first win of the year in the books, everyone is excited to see what the girls are going to be able to do when they set their minds to victory.
On Tuesday October 1st, the team took part in a huge meet against Colts Neck, Marlboro, Middletown North, and Freehold Township. Falling only two points short of four wins, the team still did an amazing job of finishing higher than Colts Neck and Marlboro to rack up two substantial victories. Girls’ coach Bill Clifton said of the team’s potential and the path to success for the rest of the year, “We have the ability, now we just need the toughness.” The team’s accomplishments so far are impressive but merely a starting point, and they all have high hopes of representing South at The Meet of Champions in late November.