The East Angel Cross Country Team kicked off the weekend with a trip to the Cheyenne Mountain Stampede, hosted on the State Meet course in Colorado Springs. First off the line was the JV Girls Team. East packed three girls in the top 10 of that race with sophomore Elena Thoman 4^th (23:09), freshman Lilia Scudamore 7^th (23:31) and sophomore Maisie Moskowitz 8^th (23:40). Sophomore Lindsey Weyant was the next finisher in 24:31, and seniors Audrey McGlothlen (24:50) and Maria Crippen (25:06) moved up nicely in the second half of the race.

The Girls Varsity race was next up, still in the heat of the day on the dusty course at the Norris-Penrose Center. Senior Laurel Kruger started off conservatively and moved her way up nicely for a 13 place finish in 21:07. Freshman AlanaMarie Barros moved up early and held on to 26^th place in 21:45. The rest of the Angels came in fairly tightly packed, led by sophomore Anna-Lucy Buddenhagen (44^th, 23:12) with freshmen Christina Doolan (49^th, 23:25) and Grace O’Meara (50^th, 23:28), senior Emily Turner (51^st, 23:36), and freshman Grace Burnett (53^rd, 23:46) following her into the equestrian stadium. This young East team took 7^th of 14 teams.

As the sun began to sink towards Pike’s Peak, the JV boys would be the next to race. Sophomores Asher Hoyt and Elijah Bruggeman showed off their varsity potential, with Hoyt easily winning the race in 18:12 and Bruggeman finishing 4^th in 18:56. Fellow sophomores Kristian Laird (20:55) and Ballard Kauffman (21:09) would be the next to cross the finish line.

Yet another sophomore, Will Daley, would lead the Boys Varsity team with a 41^st place finish in 18:28. He was followed by senior Jackson Adams (66^th, 19:26) and the freshman duo of Ben Hill (71^st, 19:38) and Ian Trautwein (73^rd, 19:42). Riley Nickols would round out the scoring for East with an 80^th place finish in 19:57 with senior Patrick Cox following closely in 20:05. East finished 13^th of 15 teams, though clearly would have moved into the top 10 had their top JV boys run in the varsity race.

Saturday morning about forty East Angels made the trip to Green Mountain High School for a scrimmage with Green Mountain, Golden, and an assortment of other area runners, both young and old, at the very challenging Ram Run 5K. Soccer midfielder and friend to cross country, junior Sammy Crippen was the first Angel across the line in 19:23 for 8^th place. Other Angel highlights included Stephen Evan (39^th, 22:08), Nikola Hannon (51^st, 22:50), Taylor Lucas (52^nd, 22:51), Julia Schor (84^th, 24:53), Isabella Garcia (109^th, 26:01) and Claire Ely (114^th, 26:08). Of runners old, East definitely had the first two coaches across the finish line as Coaches Scudamore and Fehrman represented well in 4^th and 6^th place overall. Congratulations to all the Angels who took on the brutal uphill 3^rd mile at Green Mountain.

Next week will be a busy one for the Angels. East will split squads across three meets as we travel to the Arapahoe Warrior Invitational and the Washington Park Invitational on Friday and the Centaurus Cross Country Invitational on Saturday. A few lucky Angels may even race twice this week. Check the website later in the week for entry and transportation details for these meets.

XC Alums: Anand Zuppa (2016), Andrew Wise (2013) and Devon Romero (2013)

Thanks to everyone who came to run and support the East Angel 2-mile Time Trial and First Annual Alumni Run. We had over 90 current athletes compete and eight alumni came to run with and support our Angels. Coincidentally, 90 degrees was about the temperature when the runners took off on Friday. Good job to everyone who beat the heat and then joined their teammates at The Goods where we had some fun and earned some money for the team.

In the Boys’/Men’s race, Class of ’13 star Andrew Wise, now running for Western Washington University, was the first across the line. Andrew finished with East sophomore newcomer Will Daley in a time of 11:33. Freshman Ian Trautwein was next to finish for the boys, with three other freshman – Ben Hill (6^th), Xander Pacini (7^th) and Gus Trautwein (10^th) – also among the top finishers. Senior Jackson Adams finished third, junior Sammy Crippen fourth, and senior transfer (via Texas) Patrick Cox was fifth. Rounding out the top 10 were  senior Jack “DSA” Thompson (8^th) and fit looking sophomore Riley Nickols (9^th).

In the Girls’ race, Laurel Kruger showed great fitness with a 12:41 run to win the day. Another varsity veteran, junior Emily Turner closed strong in 13:33 for second. Emily was closely followed by Alana Marie Barros, a freshman, who led the youth brigade which then followed – 10^th graders Anna Lucy Buddenhagen (4th), Elena Thompson (8^th) and Maisie Moskowitz (10^th) and 9^th graders Christina Doolan (5^th), Grace O’Meara (6^th), Grace Burnett (7^th) , and Lilia Scudamore (9^th). It wasn’t until the strong finish of senior Audrey McGlothen in 11^th that the parade of underclassmen would be interrupted.

Competition kicks off for the Angels on Friday when the Varsity and top JV will travel down to Colorado Springs to preview the State Meet course against top competition in the Cheyenne Mountain Stampede. Most of the rest of the team will get to test their mettle over a challenging 5K scrimmage at the Ram Run on Saturday at Green Mountain High School.

Check back for more information on uniform checkout and details for this week’s races.

Post run social at The Goods on Colfax.

Runners and families enjoying the patio at The Goods