NXR Northeast: Bartlett Blazes to Record Win
The NJSIAA season may be wrapped up, but cross country isn’t over for everyone. After battling the best in New Jersey over the past two weeks, several local runners took their season to the next level by lining up against elite competition from across the Northeast at the Nike Cross Regional Championships at Bowdoin Park on Saturday. The course was wet and hilly, the fields were fast, and the stakes were high, but Mercer County’s athletes rose to the challenge.
Bartlett Rewrites the Record Books
Blair Bartlett (Lawrenceville) breaks the tape at the NXR Northeast Championship 2025. | Tony Morales for MileSplit
Lawrenceville junior Blair Bartlett had already established herself as the best girl in New Jersey coming into this meet, and now she’s proven that she may be the best girl in the entire United States.
This race was supposed to be Bartlett’s first challenge of the season, where she’d face many of the top runners in the Northeast. But she quickly turned the big showdown into another solo masterclass — she gapped the field by the one-mile mark, built a 16-second lead at halfway, and continued pouring it on to win by an absurd 47 seconds.
The only suspense was just how fast Bartlett would go on the muddy, mountainous course, and the result was jaw dropping. She stopped the clock at 17:00.6! To put that incredible time in perspective, consider this:
No girl from New Jersey had ever broken 18:00 on this course before. The previous best was by another Lawrenceville star, Charlotte Bednar, who ran 18:00 in 2019.
17:00 is faster than any New Jersey girl has ever run at Holmdel Park — and Bowdoin is widely considered much more difficult than Holmdel. The Garden State record at Holmdel is 17:07 by Angelina Perez from 2021.
Bartlett is now #2 all-time at historic Bowdoin Park, which is essentially New York’s version of Holmdel Park and has also hosted NXR Northeast for almost 20 years. The only girl faster than Bartlett is the legendary Katelyn Tuohy, who ran the course record of 16:45.2 in 2018.
Bartlett’s speed rating of 166 is tied for the fastest speed rating by any girl in the entire country this fall.
Bartlett will have to wait two more weeks to see what she can do when she’s actually challenged, but then she’ll get the opportunity two weeks in a row. In addition to qualifying for Nike Cross Nationals in Portland on December 6, she received a Golden Ticket to race at the Brooks XC Championship in San Diego on December 13. So don’t tune out on cross country season just yet!
(Read a great interview with Bartlett and Coach Derrhyl Duncan by Corey Annan at NJ.com here.)
Other Girls Highlights
Kajol Karra (Princeton) kicks hard at the NXR Northeast Championship 2025. | John Nepolitan for RunnerSpace
Princeton senior Kajol Karra bounced back from a sick day at the Meet of Champions to run one of the most impressive races of her storied high school XC career. She was sitting in 55th place at the halfway point before tearing through the crowd over the last mile-and-a-half to finish 35th in 19:12.4. That new Bowdoin PR is just nine seconds off her Holmdel PR, and it’s the 6th-fastest Bowdoin time in Mercer County history.
Hopewell Valley junior Sydney Young broke 19:30 in her first ever race at Bowdoin Park, finishing an impressive 56th place in 19:29.3, which is the 7th-fastest time by Mercer County girl at Bowdoin Park. Only a few seconds back was Princeton junior Grace Hegedus, who just about equalled her course PR with a 19:32.5 for 63rd place, another excellent performance.
As a team, Princeton ran great to finish in 9th place out of 31 teams in the Championship race. They were the 3rd team from New Jersey, behind Union Catholic and Ridgewood but ahead of Paul VI and Cherokee (who both had beaten the Tigers at the Meet of Champions last week). In addition to Karra and Hegedus up front, junior Eowyn Deess delivered another big performance for 86th place in 19:52, junior Phoenix Roth not only broke her Bowdoin PR but also her Holmdel PR to take 103rd in 20:06, and Rosemary Warren clocked an impressive 20:16 to finish 120th. Those top five girls averaged 19:47, 10 seconds faster than at this meet last year. Rounding out a very deep Princeton team were sophomores Sevanne Knoch (184th in 21:06) and Isabella Franceschi (205th out of 263 finishers in 21:26).
Princeton and Hopewell Valley both ran a few girls in the open race earlier in the day, giving their runners some valuable experience at Bowdoin Park. Notable finishers included Princeton junior Emma Dweck (36th in 21:11), Hopewell Valley junior Anna Wilson (48th in 21:23), Hopewell Valley junior Sophia Pellegrino (60th in 21:33), and Princeton freshman Carolina Kime (65th in 21:37).
Boys Highlights
Agrim Jha (WWP North) finishes strong at the NXR Northeast Championship 2025. | John Nepolitan for RunnerSpace
On the boys side, WWP North’s Agrim Jha delivered the most impressive result of the day by taking 34th in the Championship race with a very quick time of 16:23.4. That time makes him the 8th-fastest Mercer County boy ever at Bowdoin Park. He was the second-fastest sophomore in the entire race.
Saboor Qureshi (Princeton) runs in the second half of the NXR Championships 2025. | Tony Morales for MileSplit
Princeton senior Saboor Qureshi closed out an incredible debut XC season by finishing 91st 16:56.1. He crossed the line just a split second ahead of WWP North junior Paul Wittenberg in 16:56.9 for 94th, as both boys broke 17:00 on their first try at Bowdoin Park.
Princeton became the first Mercer County school since 2018 to run a full boys team in the NXR Northeast Championship race. They placed 22nd out of 28 teams, led by Qureshi as well as another very strong race from junior Finn Wedmid, who placed 136th in a time of 17:19. Other Tiger finishers in the massive race included sophomore Lachlan Arnold (186th in 17:47), senior Braedyn Capone (221st in 18:02), sophomore Aleric Deess (232nd in 18:16), senior Evan Raphael (235th in 18:20), and senior Steven Cenci (248th in 18:36).
Several other Mercer County boys ran in one of the two open races, delivering exceptional results on the tough course. First among those was WWP North sophomore Rohan Varma, who ran 17:38 to place 33rd in the Blue division. Lawrenceville also had a pair of worthy representatives in that same race, with sophomore Julius Jordan taking 43rd in 17:47 and senior Bastian Bocklage running 18:02 for 61st. In the Green division, Allentown junior Sarth Shah dipped under 18:00 and grabbed 46th place in 17:59.