MAKING STRIDES: Princeton High cross country runners Finn Wedmid, left, and Rory Warren display their form in action earlier this season. Last Saturday, Wedmid and Warren starred as the PHS runners competed in the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association (NJSIAA) Group 4 state championship meet at Holmdel Park. Junior Wedmid placed 28th individually to help the PHS boys’ squad take fifth in the team standings at the meet. Sophomore Warren took 26th individually as the Tiger girls’ squad placed second in the team standings. The PHS girls received the first wild card team bid to the NJSIAA Meet of Champions on November 15 at Holmdel as the fastest of eight non-winning teams to get bids. Wedmid qualified for the MOC as an individual. (Photos by Frank Jacobs III)
By Justin Feil
Princeton High runners Rory Warren and Finn Wedmid both had high aspirations for this cross country season and both will continue chasing their goals at the Meet of Champions.
Sophomore Warren is part of the PHS girls’ team that placed second behind Ridgewood in the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association (NJSIAA) Group 4 girls state championship last Saturday at Holmdel Park. The Tigers received the first MOC wild card team bid as the fastest of eight non-winning teams to get bids.
“I’m just really happy that we’re able to move on,” said Warren, who placed 26th individually, covering the 5,000-meter course in a time of 20:17. “Obviously, we probably wanted to win groups, but going into Meet of Champions, I think we’re just going to try and see how much we can improve from this meet. And now we know we have to really up our game if we want to beat Ridgewood. And I just think we’re all now even more excited.”
Senior Kajol Karra led the Tiger girls as she took 12th overall in the Group 4 race in 19:31.33, junior Grace Hegedus placed 16th in 19:43.42, junior Eowyn Deess ran 20:03.56 for 21st, and junior Phoenix Roth was 23rd in 20:10.04 with Warren a few spots back. Sophomore Sevanne Knoch placed 95th in 22:29.00 and senior Avery Ellen Bahr came in 18th in 23:36.00. PHS get another shot at Ridgewood on the biggest stage at the MOC at Holmdel on November 15.
“I think for next week, the big thing for us is going to be being a little more patient early on and being a little more aggressive later in that race,” said PHS head coach Jim Smirk. “I think we kind of flipped our race plan a little bit from what we wanted to do. And so we need to get back to executing a little bit cleaner than we did and see where that takes us.”
Junior Wedmid is the third of three MOC individual wild-card qualifiers from the PHS boys’ team. The Tigers had hoped to go as a full team, but were two spots out of the final team wild card spot after finishing fifth in the Group 4 boys championship. Wedmid earned the 25th of 31 wild-card individual entries by placing 28th in Group 4 in a time of 17:06.02 over the 5,000-meter course.
“I’m very excited,” said Wedmid. “I’m super stoked for having the opportunity to make it in. Last year I wasn’t fortunate enough to make it, but this year I am, so that’s very, very exciting.”
Senior Saboor Qureshi continued his superb debut season by finishing 13th in Group 4 and picking up the third individual wild card spot, and sophomore Lachlan Arnold extended his breakthrough season with an incredible jump. Arnold placed 75th at last year’s sectional meet and didn’t compete in Groups, but has come back to place not just 25th in this year’s sectional but then 25th again in the Group 4 meet in 17:05.03 to reach his first MOC by earning the 20th individual wild card entry.
“Those three guys really put themselves in a great position,” said Smirk. “And I think if someone had said coming out of last year, would Princeton have captured a CVC title on the guys side and then second in the section and then had individuals qualifying out for Meet of Champions, I’m not sure that anybody really would have put any stock on that.”
Sophomore Aleric Deess was 61st for the PHS boys last Saturday while freshman Francisco Vozone took 87th, Braedyn Capone was 102nd and Ziyang Ling placed 110th. Only Qureshi, Capone and Ling are seniors.
“These guys took a tremendous step forward,” said Smirk. “I’m really proud of them. And I think one of the really exciting things is it was led by senior efforts out of Braedyn and Saboor, but clearly we have a tremendous underclass response to that. And we’re really looking forward to those guys stepping into that leadership role and that being the catalyst for great racing moving forward.”
It’s been a step up for Warren this year. Last year, she was frequently just outside PHS’s top five scoring runners. This year, she has moved up into the top five which brings with it some added responsibility and pressure.
“Being fifth, you score so that was a difference,” said Warren.
“But I think I’ve learned a lot from last year and now being a sophomore and it’s most of the same girls from last year, so we’re just an even better team and I think now I learned to trust them more. So being five isn’t that hard because I know that the rest of the team is looking out for me and we all work together well.”
Warren was racing at Holmdel for the first time this season. She missed the Shore Coaches Invitational as well as the Manhattan Invitational due to a mild injury that PHS was cautious with, but she returned to help the team capture the CVC Championship and the sectional title. She’s been a consistent and reliable part of the first five.
“She trains really hard every day, and when she races, you’re going to get a high quality effort out of her,” said Smirk. “And so, super exciting that she stepped up this year and found her stride a little bit. She tends to be pretty aggressive when we need her to be, but she’s also, for only a second-year runner on our team, really kind of very well put together in terms of tactics and also her emotional kind of placidness when she comes to a race and then also she’s a catalyst for our team. She keeps things light on bus rides and pre-meet so she’s a real pleasure to coach and really a great asset to the team.”
Warren has grown more confident and more knowledgeable about high school cross country over the past two seasons. She started running in seventh grade, and after starting out as a sprinter, drifted up to distance running. It was another big step when she joined the high school program last year.
“It was really different from middle school,” said Warren. “I think I didn’t even know what Meet of Champions was going into freshman year.”
Following her first high school season and the track and field seasons, Warren went into the summer with a bright outlook that she could help the team even more. She had that in the back of her mind throughout the offseason training.
“All summer long we ran as a group together,” said Warren.
“The team, we would meet up and run together and I just kept on thinking on runs, while this is the training this is how meets are going to be like, it’s going to be us seven on the line. And so I think every race or every practice I would just think that and then also just over the summer, every time I wanted to skip a day or something, I just thought of how if we want to be a good team, we have to hold each other accountable and I have to go do every training day ever.”
It’s paid off with moving into a scoring role for the Tigers and helping them return to the MOC. They placed second behind Union Catholic last year at New Jersey’s penultimate meet, and this meet has been a big focus for the team.
“Now we know Ridgewood’s really someone we have to look out for and also Union Catholic,” said Warren. “We’ve gotten a confidence check and we have to just make sure that we’re doing everything this next week, like fueling and doing all the proper stuff, to get ready for it. And then kind of the same mentality, just I think now we realize if we want to beat them, both teams, everyone has to run their hearts out and stuff and you can’t leave anything out on the course.”
Wedmid, too, is looking forward to having another race at Holmdel. He didn’t actually find out he had qualified as a wild card until almost 24 hours after his groups race.
“You feel a little helpless there when you’re just waiting,” said Wedmid.
He comes off a personal best on the Holmdel course at groups. He’s hoping he can go even faster amidst the state’s top runners and break the 17-minute mark on the legendary course. The MOC was a motivator that he had hoped for since last year’s group meet.
“Last year I was racing groups and I was like, if I get into Meet of Champs that’d be cool, but I wasn’t expecting it at all,” said Wedmid. “Meanwhile, this year it was a real possibility and while I knew it wasn’t a certainty, just the possibility of making it was a lot larger as long as I put that work in. And as a result, I worked a lot over the summer and the team helped me a lot throughout the way. Me and Saboor and Lachy, we all work very hard, so I’m glad all three of us can make it in. And it is disappointing that the rest of the team can’t come along with us, but hopefully they’ll cheer us on.”
Wedmid credits some of this year’s team success to the group doing more together outside of training. They built chemistry hanging out together and that translated into meets. They’ll try to put together a similar formula next year when Arnold and Wedmid will be the top runners returning for the PHS boys. Competing in the MOC will give them experience at the highest level and reinforce some of the big goals that they have ahead.
“My overall goal for next year for cross country doesn’t really change, I think it just shows me how it’s much more possible,” said Wedmid. “I want to just improve as much as possible, see if I can be a real threat to other kids in the county and the state. I want to hopefully drive the team. If the team overall can win more competitions — because we won counties this year — if we can do that next year, if we can pull that off with a bunch of our current seniors leaving, I’d be happy with us for that.”