Numbers on the low side for Spencer cross country this fall
A small team will be taking the field in cross country for the Spencer Rockets this season. Still dealing with some of the repercussions of restrictions from last season, the team has a much more normal season to look forward to, giving the younger athletes a much better experience with the sport.
About 10 athletes, perhaps a couple more, will make up the roster of the Spencer cross country team this year, said coach Jason Miller. With the team divided almost in half between seniors and underclassmen, he said the team will be focusing more on individual performance this year rather than team success.
“We’re still a little down,” he said about the team’s numbers. “Last year, due to COVID, we had some runners who didn’t come out at all and looks like they may never come back.”
Numbers are not the only thing that COVID-19 had an effect on, said Miller. Last year, there were a lot of restrictions on meets the cross country teams were able to run, limiting the number of competitors on race day. That limitation, he said, stunted the athletes’ growth and prevented them from reaching their full potential.
“Last year our largest meet was a quad meet,” he said. “It’s hard to get experience with that. We never got a chance for them to really run a meet with others, they would be running the whole race and never see anyone else. It’s hard to improve if you can’t see anyone else.”
With the schedule for this season back to normal and with no limitations so far on the number of teams and athletes that can participate in a given meet, Miller said he is hopeful that the Rockets will be able to have more success this season.
“It is pretty close to normal,” he said. “The meets are normal as far as I can tell . The schedule is like normal, we have all of our meets that we normally would.”
Although Miller said the team will focus more on individual performance, he said there are several members he is expecting will perform well this season, including seniors Emily Wehrman, Caleb Rucker and Kaizer Eickleberry and junior Malachai Anderson. These athletes, he said, have the most experience in the group and have shown plenty of skill in prior years.
“It’s so hard to tell (how the athletes will do later in the season),” he said. “I’m not sure where other teams are at but we are looking at our runners as individuals. Caleb and Emily, Kaizer and Malachai are all good runners, they were some of our top runners from last year.”
Making up the Spencer cross country team this year are seniors Aurone Porek, Emily Wehrman, Caleb Rucker, Ai Takamizawa and Kaizer Eickleberry. Malachai Anderson is the team’s only junior and Danieea Guzman is the team’s only sophomore. The team also has three freshmen in Theresa Knecht, Lucas Matteson and Levi Anderson.
The Spencer cross country team first competed in a meet on Aug. 26 in Pittsville. They will next compete on Aug. 31 at 9 Mile County Park and on Sept. 4 and 7 at Wildwood Park.
CHEYENNE THOMAS/STAFF PHOTO
