50p
Cross Country Running Rambles
Coming fresh out of a relaxed 2020 season that saw a halt to inter-school racing, the Cross Country team found success and community in an uncertain time. The beginning of the year started with many new faces joining the program, each of which was welcomed into the team with a trail nickname and a personalized handshake with Mr Skardal.
It is a cross country tradition to start each day with a killer ab workout run by Mr Skardal (we were kept motivated by Mrs Reynolds’s timekeeping and elevator music). Local runs varied between hill work, speed drills, and the occasional day of Kindergarten games. Destination runs brought us to many exciting trails that added variation to our training program, including Shawnigan and Thetis Lakes.
As Brentwood was unable to have a competitive season in ‘19-’20 despite all our training, we were quite excited to return to competition. The year started with the “Second Wind” Cowichan Valley Series of four local races where the Grade 8, Junior, and Senior categories had numerous wins and ribbons each time. We later attended the Vancouver Island Cross Country Championships where Neve M and Luise H individually qualified for Provincials, alongside our Senior Girls and Senior Boys teams. This success sent ten athletes to Jericho Beach in Vancouver for the BC Secondary Schools Cross Country Championships - a Brentwood record. The day of provincials, there were extremely muddy conditions and surprisingly slippery turns, but each runner performed their best and certainly came away with a life-long memory.
The joys of XC came not just from the results, but the pain we all went through together. Everyone in the program improved by the end of the term, both as runners and as people. We would like to express our profound appreciation for everything Mrs Reynolds and Mr Skardal have done for the program, because without them no part of cross country would be this amazing.
Edward “Eddie the Crowbar” L & Lucinda “Smulligan Mulligan” G, Captains
It is a cross country tradition to start each day with a killer ab workout run by Mr Skardal (we were kept motivated by Mrs Reynolds’s timekeeping and elevator music). Local runs varied between hill work, speed drills, and the occasional day of Kindergarten games. Destination runs brought us to many exciting trails that added variation to our training program, including Shawnigan and Thetis Lakes.
As Brentwood was unable to have a competitive season in ‘19-’20 despite all our training, we were quite excited to return to competition. The year started with the “Second Wind” Cowichan Valley Series of four local races where the Grade 8, Junior, and Senior categories had numerous wins and ribbons each time. We later attended the Vancouver Island Cross Country Championships where Neve M and Luise H individually qualified for Provincials, alongside our Senior Girls and Senior Boys teams. This success sent ten athletes to Jericho Beach in Vancouver for the BC Secondary Schools Cross Country Championships - a Brentwood record. The day of provincials, there were extremely muddy conditions and surprisingly slippery turns, but each runner performed their best and certainly came away with a life-long memory.
The joys of XC came not just from the results, but the pain we all went through together. Everyone in the program improved by the end of the term, both as runners and as people. We would like to express our profound appreciation for everything Mrs Reynolds and Mr Skardal have done for the program, because without them no part of cross country would be this amazing.
Edward “Eddie the Crowbar” L & Lucinda “Smulligan Mulligan” G, Captains