Cambria Wu
It isn’t December without a Cross Country Club Nationals Championship race. And it isn’t a cross-country championship race without a battle, right? Whether it’s balancing work life and mom life, training to hit a marathon Olympic Trials qualifying time while committing to team goals, or finding a return to fitness and racing after just a few months postpartum—it’s a battle.
On December 14th, 2019, on a cold, muddy, wet day in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, our Masters’ 40+ team won that battle, demonstrating not only a victory over the record number of participants in the field on the famous Lehigh University Cross-Country course, but also a victory over the brutal course conditions—that—let’s be honest—sometimes can get a little more intimidating with age, fear of injuries, thought of “what am I still doing out here,” etc. But those conditions, I have to say, can make a win on the East Coast for a bunch of Southern California natives, just a little bit sweeter.
I’m not going to lie—we pretty much group text one another about the weather for, oh, approximately a month beforehand, debating full tights or capris, what length spikes to bring, and what about the ridiculous luggage requirements of spirit airlines?! But with our armor finally decided upon (and somehow packed into tiny backpacks with afterparty attire in there somewhere, OBVIOUSLY), we make it happen.
The trip. The battle. The afterparty. We kiss our small children goodbye for the weekend, hire substitutes despite it being December and only one week remaining before winter break, lay out our uniforms and pin on the numbers the night before the race, and try to get some sleep, even though we KNOW that our bodies are seasoned veterans when it comes to racing (and pretty much living) on just a few hours of sleep.
So when the gun goes off the next morning, all thoughts of the season, current fitness levels, comparisons to years or championships past—even longings for the future—seem to splash away as we hit that first giant swamp of mud within the first 2 minutes of the race. We’re just out here—again—nervous, happy, proud—competing—ready to do battle and make it happen.
Our Masters 40+ team took the first place title for the second year in a row, by only 8 points, beating a field of 25 teams—twice the size of the field the previous year in Spokane.
Our Masters 50+ team placed 7th overall, in a field of 25 teams—again a record number of participants,–and while it was a year plagued by injuries for our 50+ women, we managed to get 3 warriors to toe the line in Bethlehem.
We were lucky to have Kathleen Cushing-Murray back on the course despite a lingering knee injury, as well as storied competitor Victoria Cook-Chapus, who finally put on that Janes uniform that we have been begging her to wear for several years now.
As if conditions for the Masters men’s and women’s races weren’t brutal enough, it really began raining for the later races, and our Open Women’s team got their spikes plenty soaked (and some bloodied) in a huge, muddy field of over 400 women, finishing 27th out of 48 teams.
She was followed by solid performances by Emily Bernath (22:38), Sarah Peterson (23:32), Mallory Fratta, and Gwendolen Twist, our MVP(!), who doubled back from the earlier Masters race to help our team have a 5th scorer.
