Cross country season off to fast start

Photo of Hannah Gilbert, no. 69, by Lance Masterson.

Hannah Gilbert is the senior leader for the Central High School varsity girls cross country team. Photo is from 2023 and was taken during a race at Ash Creek Preserve, Western Oregon University. Photo by Lance Masterson.

Hannah Gilbert may not feel so isolated this year.

The senior member of the Panthers girls cross country team was its only varsity runner a year ago. That’s because the team came up short in the numbers game. As in, it had five runners on the roster. As in, all but Gilbert ran junior varsity.

Early season optimism suggests that could change this year. For one thing, there are nine runners on this year’s girls team.

“We have a lot of new runners who are trying to figure out what this is all about. We have a very young team, so just trying to support them,” Gilbert said. “We have each other, which is different. I felt pretty isolated last year.”

With numbers come advantages.

“They can go off and do things and it feels like a more significant group of girls,” coach Eli Cirino said of the boost. “There’s definitely camaraderie there.”

There’s also opportunity. The runners will get their shot to establish themselves, and that shot will come against some of the best competition in the state.

“We’re going to give them the opportunity to run varsity early on,” the coach added. “They’ve shown at workouts that they’re making big gains.”

Gilbert begins the season feeling good physically. This, too, represents a change from years past.

“I struggled with injuries all throughout high school, whether it was shin splints or fractures or whatever they may be. My back kept me from running a couple of races last year,” she said. “So just staying strong and maintaining my health the whole season, and just being there for my girls.”

She is unquestionably the team’s leader.

“Hannah has been great. You can see the joy that she shows on a daily basis,” Eli Cirino said. “She’s been really good about just stepping up and leading this group.”

Photo of Aidan Wendring, no. 744, was submitted.

Numbers aren’t quite the problem for a boys team with 18 runners. The Panthers are led by juniors Ty Cirino and Aidan Wendring and senior Truman Swartzfager. They each ran upwards of 500 miles over summer.

“Those guys are fit as heck and looking really good,” their coach said. “We definitely have high expectations for these guys.”

Their teammates followed the trio’s example.

“Most everybody took some time off during the summer vacation to go and do stuff, go on vacation, etcetera,” Eli Cirino said. “But most of these guys were also pretty plugged into what we were doing. We trained four days a week together.”

Practices averaged 10 to 12 runners.

Results from an Aug. 23rd time trial are encouraging.

“We had kids run almost a minute faster than they did in the mile a year ago,” the coach said. “We are optimistic right now.”

Ty Cirino is firmly entrenched as the team’s top runner. He is the school’s record holder in the 5K, placed fifth at state last year and is the defending Mid-Willamette Conference champion. His record, 15:02, was set in 2023 at the Rose City Championships.

He enters the season driven to run even faster.

“I want to go sub 15 minutes in the 5K. Hopefully, make state as a team. Hopefully, at state also, individually, going top three,” Ty Cirino said.

Swartzfager enters the season on a roll.

“The last couple of months, I’ve been able to piece together a lot of solid weeks, and the buildup I had at the end of track season … it’s the most amount of weeks that I’ve been able to put together without having an injury,” Swartzfager said. “This is the fittest I’ve ever been.”

He was fit enough to take on cross country at its most grueling - the Steens Mountain Running Camp in July. Where he was joined by Wendring and the Cirinos.

“The biggest thing about Steens is it gives you the mental state to have a good season. It lets you visualize with a lot of people who want to do the same thing,” Swartzfager added.

Wendring was fourth at district and 14th at state.

A third junior, Keagan Korbe is penciled into a prominent role as well.

“(Korbe) is probably our fourth guy right now,” Eli Cirino said. “That’s well established. But like I said, our young guys are developing rapidly.”

Who runs in spots five through seven is to be determined. That will change as runners jockey for position. Besides, a little competition never hurt anyone, especially a cross country squad.

“I feel it makes it pretty fun for the rest of our team,” Eli Cirino said of positioning. “I’d say we have six or seven other guys who could potentially be earning one of those other varsity spots.”

Central begins this season pretty much like it did last season. With three talented runners backed by an improving supporting cast. The team lost experienced runners to graduation while others chose not to run this year.

“We’re a few guys short of where we’d like to be. But our young guys are stepping up,” Eli Cirino said. “We’ll probably, initially, have a huge gap between our number one and our number five through seven guys. But the younger guys are all growing rapidly, improving rapidly. They’re … getting stronger every day.”

Improvement is needed if the team is to equal last year’s success. The Panthers’ boys placed third at the district finals. They expect to be near the top again, though the early title favorite is Corvallis.

The Spartans are “absolutely loaded. I think they could challenge the top two teams in the state. They’re that good,” Eli Cirino said.

The MWC itself is loaded, with Crescent Valley, South Albany and Silverton expected to join the Panthers in battling for state finals bids.

Central finished sixth in state in 2023.

The cross country season began Aug. 30 with The Opener at Ash Creek Preserve, Western Oregon University. Other early meets include the Utlimook Race in Tillamook, Sept. 7, and then home for the Ash Creek XC Festival, Sept. 13-14, again at WOU.