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The Raiders Cross Country team has had two races recently, both with strong races from key individuals according to Head Coach Joseph Rabaey.

“We had a great meet last Tuesday at Mahtomedi, and another great meet this week at Hudson,” said Rabaey. “Last week at Mahtomedi, most of our runners had their best race of the season. We especially had great races from Noah Quigley and Aaron Herber, who both ran their best races of the year. This week at Hudson, Linnea Ronning had another great race, winning the meet for the girls against some stiff competition.”

In Mahtomedi, Hastings girls with Ronning placing second with a time of 20:17.3. Ivy Brandenburg placed 15th at 23:32.6. Elise Atkins was 16th with 24:03.1, Lucy Burmeister finished in 24:07.2 to finish in 18th place and Jordyn Doughty placed 21st with a time of 24:44.7 to round out the top five scoring positions. Hastings scored a 72 as a team and was only 31 points behind first place.

For the boys, Quigley finished in 23rd place with a time of 18:46.8, Max Albertson finished 37th with 19:27.5, Josiah Trost finished 40th at 19:50.5, Herber 41st with 19:56.6 and Aiden Reuter 50th with 20:18.0. The boys finished fifth overall with a team score of 140. St. Thomas Academy finished first with a 35.

a little different than the runners are used too, Coach Rabaey explained.

“The Hudson meet was organized by grade level, and we had six girls place within the top 10 for their grade level: Lindsay Mathison (ninth for 12th grade girls), EC Atkins (10th for 11th grade girls), Eve Lawson (third for 10th grade girls), Lucy Burmeister (sixth for ninth grade girls), Ivy Brandenburg (fifth for ninth grade girls), and Linnea Ronning (first for ninth grade girls and first overall). The girls team placed third out of 12 teams, which was an outstanding result. The boys had some great races and grade level finishes, with Aiden Reuter (11th for ninth grade boys), and Max Albertson (17th for senior The boys finished eighth as a team with a score of 220. Hudson topped the leaderboard with a score of 40. Max Albertson led the way for Hastings with a 40th place finish, Trost finished 43rd, Herber finished 55th, Quigley 63rd and Reuter finished 69th overall to round out the top five.

For the girls, Belle Plaine sat atop the leaderboard with 36 points followed by Hudson with 61 and Hastings with 79. Ronning won her first race of the year to take the top spot overall, followed by Lawson in 13th, Brandenburg in 14th, Burmeister in 26th and Atkins in 31st for the top five girls.

Friday, September 30th, Hastings heads to Red Wing to an invite at 4 p.m., then to Simley for their invite at 10 a.m. on October 8. The final race of the conference season takes place October 18 at 3:30 p.m. with the location yet to be determined.

The Hastings Boys Cross Country team had already run their race at Mahtomedi before this reporter had arrived on scene. A quick “help me out boys” and they jumped right in to stage a start photo. That makes this photo so much more entertaining, shows these kids are awesome humans and that they have a great sense of humor. Special thanks to Aaron Herber for getting everyone on board so easily! Left to right, front row: Jacob Sinclair, Josiah Trost, Aiden Reuter, Gabe Peterson, Brock Bauer, Aaron Herber, Ethan Hoff. Back row: Will Carry, Noah Klippen, Braylon Meyers (partially covered), Isaac Bushberger, and Finn Caturia. Photo by Bruce Karnick