The Red Devil cross country team runs to victory at the Amphitheater.

“It’s fantastic, a nonstop party and that’s great,” said Jae Kwon’15 of the atmosphere of the cross country team.  The general feeling of every cross country meet and practice is easily the most defining quality; they have a closeness that is well noted and enviable among sports teams.

The first step of any new season is adjusting to new challenges. “We lost some great runners like Chase [Lewark] and [Andrew] Cartright, but we’re making up for it with the new runners coming in as well,” says Kwon.  The boy’s team has at least two freshmen consistently running varsity, Dylan and Copper Williams. Younger athletes are considered as valuable as the older ones, said Kwon.

That isn’t to say that the older runners are not pulling their weight. Jake Cohen’15 has been talking to college scouts since his freshman year, and runner Bobbie Burgess beat both the records for the school and the Carmel Classic meet when she finished with a time of 17:57 in the August 18^th meet.

“She’s amazing… she could win state this year,” Kwon predicts.

Though the team lost to Carmel by a point at the Carmel Classic on the 18th, the runners see that as less of a loss and more of a point to rally around.  The team hopes that with enough hard work they can overcome those obstacles.

“It’s actually fantastic how hard everyone is working,” says Chloe Davis’14.

The West Lafayette High School Cross Country teams have certainly set high goals for themselves; winning state is by no accounts an easy feat, but through a combination of hard work and just genuinely loving what they do, they plan on getting there.