Harwood XC competes for state titles on Halloween
October 30, 2020 | By John Kerrigan
The Harwood Boys and Girls Cross-Country teams travel to Thetford on Saturday to race in the Vermont state title meet on trails designed by Olympian and master trail builder John Morton.
The wooded Thetford trail has a series of tough climbs, ending with “Morty’s Monster” because if a hill has a name, it has to be a tough hill. The course suits the Highlanders - who run hills every day - very well.
Harwood teams have won 26 Vermont state titles while racing on the Thetford Course. The boys and girls are even with 13 state titles each. Harwood Girls are the returning state champions with nine state titles in the last 10 years. The Harwood Boys last won a championship in 2014.
This year the boys are hoping for a second-place finish as the U-32 Boys are a strong favorite to repeat. While the boys have been running strong and likely to peak on Saturday, they have played nip-and-tuck with No. 2 Spaulding this season. Harwood beat U-32 on a sixth-place finish tie-breaker on the Highlander home course; it also edged U-32 by one point on their home course.
Long known as an ice hockey powerhouse, it’s nice to see the boys from Barre stepping it up in Cross-Country.
Harwood’s Carlton Cummiskey finished 8th at the 2019 D-II state meet and he hopes to improve that finish this year. He will be backed up by a group of other runners who have been running strong: seniors Vinny Spina, Luke Groom, Tyler Silveria, and Mason Berry; junior Ebbe Lillis, and sophomore Rye MacCurtain.
The contest to watch will be the girls as they fight to fend off U-32, rated No. 1 in D-II by Athletic.net. The teams met only once this season at the SeaHornet Invitational on Oct. 3 in Williston and the Highlanders left with a one-point victory. Harwood’s No. 2 runner, freshman Julia Thurston, was the difference in that meet, outkicking U-32’s No. 1 runner at the finish.
The U-32 girls have been runners-up to Harwood the last two years and will be loaded for bear. But the Highlander team with its array of underclassmen poses a good match against U-32’s senior-laden lineup. Ava Thurston, Harwood’s Gatorade All-American athlete, returns to defend her state title. She will have support from her sister Julia, Britta Zetterstrom (sixth in 2019), Charlie Flint (10th in 2019), Caelyn McDonough (12th in 2019), and Anlu Thamm (20th in 2019).
Harwood girls lost their captain and team leader Julianne Young (11th in 2019) to graduation. However, freshman McKenna Paxman has been improving dramatically and could fill the gap left by Young. After the Rice meet recently, teammate Maisie Frank remarked, “McKenna really killed it today.”
Despite all of the interruptions in the fall schedule – the late start, cancellations due to weather, restrictions to training during a worldwide pandemic – Harwood’s runners are ready to do their best at Thetford.
The girls race is at 10 a.m.; boys at 10:30 a.m. Reminder that spectators are not allowed at the meet. The races will be streamed live on Upper Valley Community Access TV’s YouTube channel.
Harwood’s Head Cross-Country Coach John Kerrigan is in the RunVermont Hall of Fame. Special thanks to the Zetterstrom family for photo submissions.