Though not at full strength, the North Crawford cross-country teams competed at the Viroqua Hills Golf Course on Thursday, Sept. 4.

With most of the teams at the meets being Division 1 and Division 2 schools, the Trojans showed that they could be very competitive.

For the boys, LaCrosse Central won the meet with 51 points for the 5,000-meter course (3.1 miles). North Crawford did not have enough members competing to make a full team, but had some very impressive times.

On the girls side, competing in 5,000 meters as well (new rule this year, in the past, girls have only run 4,000 meters), Westby won the meet with 48 points.

Junior team captain Jacob Bransky ran the fastest race for the Troajn boys with a time of 20:15.97, good enough for 30th place out of 131 competitors. Next for the Trojans, was Dylan Ghormley in 92nd with a time of 23:19.50, followed by teammate Jack Polensky in 105th with a time of 25:23.78.

For the girls, newcomer foreign exchange student Nina Zastrow crossed the finish line first for the Trojans in 12th place in an outstanding time of 23:02.12. Teammate and captain Willa Dworshack showed great determination and ended in 24th with a time of 24:29.74. Next for the ladies was freshman Kylie Heisz who ran a great race in a time of 29:29.90 and ended in 70th place while fellow runner sophomore Ahme Varnes-Epstein ended in 85th with a time of 32:12.31. There were 106 runners in the girls race.

“We have a great showing for the first real meet of the year,”  Bransky for the boys and Zastrow and Dworshack for the girls looked very strong for us and hope they get the rest of the runners pushing for good times,” Coach Allbaugh said of the race. “It will be an interesting year, as the team is being pushed to its limits, but we struggling with a few injuries at the moment.”