Last Week in Review

Nike Cross Nationals

Ohioans performed well at the Nike Cross Nationals (NXN) Championships in both the individual and team competitions.

Starting on the girls side, Magnificat, running as Rocky River XC Club, improved on their 16th place finish at the 2008 NXN Championship and finished their 2009 Cross Country campaign with a fifth place national finish.  The team of Madeline Chambers, Clare Fischer, Abby Fischer, Katherine Stultz, Abigail Marquard, Erin Riley and Mary Whitmore scored a total of 195 points, just four points behind the fourth place team, Newhall XC Club. 

Individually on the girls side, Chambers finished 8th with a time of 17:59.80.  Hannah Neczypor of North Royalton finished just outside of the top 10 with an 11th place finish, by crossing the line at 18:04.30.  Glen Este's  Michelle Thomas finshed in 37th place with a time of 18:36.70.  A late addition to the NXN Championships and the final individual Ohioan to qualify, Christina Blair of Cuyahoga Valley Christian Academy crossed the finish line at 19:23.10 and finished 101st overall.

On the guys side, Ohio had just two qualifiers and both performed extremely well.  Zach Wills of Mason was with the lead pack and had just surged to the top two or three places when the final set of hay bale jumps came up.  Wills stepped on the first hay bale of three and never got his rythm back as he slipped  to a 5th place finish with a time of 15:18.50.  The other Ohioan to qualify was Michael Brajdic of Bay, who finished 27th overall in a time of 15:43.60.

RunnerSpace had great coverage of the event, which can be found at http://www.runnerspace.com/nxn, below are some of the videos that feature Ohio runners.

RunnerSpace video with Hannah Neczypor of North Royalton the friday before the race:

RunnerSpace video with Christina Blair of Cuyahoga Valley Christian Academy the friday before the race:

 RunnerSpace video with Michael Brajdic of Bay the friday before the race:

 RunnerSpace video with Zach Wills of Mason the friday before the race:

 RunnerSpace video with Zach Wills of Mason after the race

 RunnerSpace video of the 2009 NXN Midwest Recap Show