The Cross Country team had a successful season this year and once again proved to be difficult to defeat. Both the girls and the boys team have improved throughout their season and have become faster each time they practice. After working hard at practice at the beach and running through endless uphill tracks, the cross country team did an excellent performance on all their races and went to finals ready to succeed.  The boys varsity team won first place with their race while the girls team was just 2 points away from finishing second place. The top runners for the boys Varsity team were German Partida, finishing 6th place overall; Mauro Martinez, finishing 7th place overall;  and Carlos Guardado, who finished 8th place overall. The boys went back home excited for their victory and didn’t leave without taking their team pictures with their plaque they were awarded after announcing their victory on the race. The girls were really close to making it to 3rd place, but they came up short with just 2 points. However, the girls’ Cross Country team captain, Luisa Mejia, finished 5th place out of 45 other runners and went to the Prelims as a single runner. She and the 7 varsity boys kept practicing to get ready for their CIF Prelims game.

The boys varsity team and Luisa Mejia were proud of their achievements and went to the Prelims race with the mentality that no matter what happens, they will continue to be proud of what they’ve achieved and will remain with their head up high. Many teams, of different divisions, raced in the Prelims and our runners were certainly nervous, but also ready to represent HMSA against all the teams they were racing. Luisa Mejia raced  before the boys. The boys were excited and cheered her up all throughout the race. She finished in an impressive 57th place out of 161 runners overall. The boys also ran against many other runners and finished 12th place out of 17 other teams. However, the boys finished their 3 miles with impressive times. The top runner was Angel Briones, who finished 44th out of 125, with a time of 17:41.5. When asked what was their biggest motivation this season, Senior Erick Mejia responded,” Our goal this year was to bring home the fourth league title in a row, and in the final race, we were able to destroy CAMS. In our first meet, we lost to CAMS by 15 points and we knew that CAMS was ready to fight for the title this year, so we took our loss as an inspiration for keep improving and get faster. We had to work harder to continue the Cross Country Championship streak”.

After so much hard work, the cross country season is over and they made sure to, once again, make history and bring a plaque back home, recognizing their success. Senior Ammabel Culajay said, ” The boys team accomplished their goal of winning the coastal league title for the 4th year in a row. For us girls however injuries showed up at the end and ended our season at the coastal league final. So we weren’t able to go to the CIF Prelims, except for Luisa,  but I can say the goal of having a strong girls team was accomplished.” They gave it all out and are proud of their improvements and achievements. HMSA can once more say that they are proud of their Cross Country team and can’t wait to see more achievements coming.