Week 4 Recap: Bowdoin Park Classic, Six Flags Wild Safari Invitational, and Thompson Park Class Meet
This week and the next are the biggest of the regular season, where the weekends feature large races against strong competition on major courses. The main events this week were the Bowdoin Park Classic, the Six Flags Wild Safari Invitational, and the Thompson Park Class Meet.
Bowdoin Park Classic
Despite being hosted at a historic New York course, the Bowdoin Park Classic has become a favorite destination for New Jersey’s top teams. Bowdoin Park, the course itself, will be the site of the Nike Cross Regionals for the Northeast region, and this is the only chance for Garden State schools to get some experience on it. And experience is necessary — the course effectively goes up and back down a small mountain, and it’s generally considered more difficult than even Holmdel.
Girls
Blair Bartlett (Lawrenceville, Jr.) powers to the line to win the Bowdoin Park Classic. | John Nepolitan for RunnerSpace
In her first ever race featuring real hills, Lawrenceville junior Blair Bartlett unleashed another showstopping performance, winning by 36 seconds in a time of 18:02. That makes her the second-fastest New Jersey girl ever at Bowdoin Park – which is especially impressive given that it’s been the site of NXR Northeast for almost 20 years. She is also top 30 all-time when including New York schools, who run this historic course for both NXR and their version of the Meet of Champions.
Who’s #1 all-time from New Jersey? None other than Lawrenceville’s Charlotte Bednar, who ran 18:00 in 2019. Talk about a hard school record to beat! But Bartlett should feel good about her chances of taking down that record at NXR in November – not to mention senior year.
Grace Hegedus (Princeton, Jr.) climbs a hill alongside Cecelia Ludwig (Cumberland (RI), So.) at the Bowdoin Park Classic. | John Nepolitan for RunnerSpace
The Princeton girls also had incredible races at Bowdoin. Senior Kajol Karra and junior Grace Hegedus teamed up for the first two-thirds of the race and both walked away with phenomenal times and top-10 medals. Karra took 7th overall in 19:18, with Hegedus finishing next in 19:31 for 8th place. Their 7-8 finish is an improvement from their 9-10 finish at this meet last fall, and both of them set course PRs by a few seconds.
Sophomore Rosemary Warren, also stepped up big time to finish 19th with a time of 20:13, fifteen seconds faster than what was already a very impressive run of hers at NXR last fall. Junior Phoenix Roth finished 21st in 20:37, and sophomore Sevanne Knoch joined her in the top 25 with a time of 20:50. Princeton’s five scorers all matched or beat their fastest times ever on this course.
Not far behind, junior Eowyn Deess delivered a strong 20:56 for 27th place in her return to the varsity lineup. Freshman Carolina Kime (33rd in 21:15) and junior Emma Deweck (35th in 21:27) both ran excellent debuts on this challenging course.
In the team scoring, Princeton finished 2nd with 62 points, 13 points behind winners Cumberland from Rhode Island. Cumberland finished 3rd at last year’s NXR Northeast – one place ahead of Princeton – and they look to be in the hunt for one of the two auto-qualifying spots again this year, so this result helped Princeton gauge how they stack up in the regional competition. While they’ll need to flip the script against Cumberland in November, the good news for Princeton is that they’re an even better postseason team than a regular season team. Last year, they dropped their team average 25 seconds between the Bowdoin Park Classic and NXR Northeast.
Boys
On the boys side, Princeton placed 11th out of 25 schools in the Varsity II race (and 15th out of 49 schools in the merge). Senior Saboor Qureshi led the way in 29th place with a time of 17:03, which is a fantastic result in one of his first ever hilly races. Sophomore Lachlan Arnold also impressed with a 51st place finish in 17:45, and his junior teammate Finn Wedmid followed right behind him in 17:47 for 53rd place. Senior Bradeyn Capone had a nice return to Princeton’s lineup with a time of 18:00.
Another local boy to go sub-18:00 was Lawrenceville senior Bastian Bocklage. Lawrenceville didn’t run a full team, but Bocklage represented the Big Red well by taking 59th place in 17:52.
Six Flags Wild Safari Invitational
Aside from cutting through an amusement park, the Six Flags Wild Safari Invitational is best known for being one of the fastest courses around. With decent weather on Saturday morning, many Mercer County runners scored new all-time 5K PRs.
Boys
Dhruv Kumar (WWP South, Jr.) finishes strong in the Varsity A race at the Six Flags Wild Safari Invitational. | Tom Smith for MileSplit
In the Varsity A race for the largest schools, WWP South got great results from their whole squad and won the team title by a wide margin over Edison, 68 to 126. The Pirates were led by the stellar sophomore duo Aron Zola (7th in 16:32) and Sean Maina (8th in 16:38). One of their most surprising performers was junior Dhruv Kumar, who chopped over a minute off his PR to take 11th in 16:46. Even their 4th and 5th runners went under 17:30, with Harsh Sharma taking 18th in 17:16 and Nivas Palaniappan finishing 24th in 17:24. For good measure, they put their 6th man Aradhya Vijay (40th in 17:54) ahead of every other team’s 5th man.
The Pirates also ran a stacked team in the freshman 3200m. Led by Aidan Fan (6th in 10:32) and Ayush Jain (8th in 10:38), their top five averaged a speedy 10:59 and claimed the team win by 20 points over Seton Hall Prep.
Joining WWP South in the Varsity A 5K race was Hightstown, who finished 5th out of 21 teams. They got a big run up front from senior Mason Johnson, who broke 17:00 for the first time by running 16:59 for 12th place. Dhuriva Sribuddharju (23rd in 17:23) and Javin Spearman (26th in 17:29) also came through with big PRs for the Rams.
Allentown competed in the Varsity B race, where they finished 3rd behind NJ #18 Ocean City and level on points with Phillipsburg. Their star senior John O’Leary once again delivered a strong performance, finishing 9th in 16:11, which was the fastest time of the day among Mercer County boys. In the merged results, his time was good for 19th out of 642 finishers. His younger teammates also dropped impressive PRs. Ryan Heissler’s 16:36 for 14th place was 4th-best among all sophomores at the meet, and Reed Huggins’s 16:47 for 18th place was 2nd-best among all freshmen. Sarth Shah followed in 17:09, and Matthew Brueggemeier broke 18:00 for the first time with a 17:46 for 48th place.
The Redbirds also revealed another talented freshman, Christopher Argilan, who placed 4th in the freshman 3200m with a very quick time of 10:26. That result dwarfed the early-season marks he had posted at Cherokee Challenge and Thompson 2 Miler.
Robbinsville finished 15th in the Varsity B race. Senior Alex Yu ran a strong last 1.5 miles to finish 51st in 17:53, breaking 18:00 for the first time.
Princeton Day placed 8th overall out of 25 teams in Varsity D, the small-school division. Grayson McLaughlin continued trending upward this season, taking home a medal after running 17:18 for 22nd place. Fellow senior Alexander Chia also had a nice showing and finished 36th in 17:33, just a few seconds off his 5K PR.
Girls
Risha Rao (WWP South, Jr.) posts the top time of the day for Mercer County girls at the Six Flags Wild Safari Invitational. | Tom Smith for MileSplit
Hightstown finished 11th out of 20 teams in Varsity A. The Rams were led by their senior duo of Madalyne Ng (51st in 22:42) and Hayley Watkins (53rd in 22:54), and their squad’s 1-5 spread of 2:01 was one of the tightest in the entire meet.
Also competing in Varsity A was WWP South, who finished 13th as a team but got some great performances near the front. Junior Risha Rao, running her first invitational 5K of the season, crushed a 40-second PR of 20:03 for 12th place. Fellow junior Shivani Joshi also leveled up with a big PR of 21:39 for 30th place.
In the Varsity B race, Allentown finished 6th out of 23 teams. Freshman Addison Frascella (19th in 20:17) once again led the way, and junior Emma Ruchelman (22nd in 20:20) ran a strong last mile to finish just a couple of seconds later in a massive 5K PR. Sophomore Isabella Maltese (40th in 21:14) also had a breakout race and chopped over 90 seconds off her PR. The Redbirds also got two medalists in the freshman 3200m, with Vivian La Froscia taking 14th in 12:52 and Avery Rizzo finishing 20th in 13:05.
Robbinsville also ran in the Varsity B race, finishing in 14th place. Freshman Sunaya Nayee (71st in 22:31) had a strong 5K debut, and sophomore Sahaili Patel (78th in 22:43) also ran a nice PR.
Princeton Day didn’t have a full team in the Varsity D race, but they were led by juniors Olivia Lumba (67th in 22:37) and Syona Gautam (73rd in 22:54).
Thompson Park Classic
A few other Mercer County schools opted to get some more experience on the Thompson Park course, which will host major postseason meets like the CVC Championships and sectionals this fall. The Thompson Park Class Meet divided up runners by grade, with the freshmen running two miles and the everyone else racing the full 5K course.
Boys
Tyler Hurst (Steinert, Sr.) sprints to the line at the Thompson Park Class Meet. | Jeff Granit for NJ Advance Media
Steinert’s Tyler Hurst finished 12th in the senior race in 17:13, the fastest time of the day among Mercer County runners. Adam Szpakowski also dipped under 18:00 and ran 17:59 for 26th among seniors. In the sophomore race, William Conway delivered a big breakout performance and finished 8th in 17:54, which was a new outright 5K PR even with having to climb Thompson Park’s hills.
Lawrence’s Harrison Petrick showed off his new level of fitness this year and crushed his old Thompson Park PR by over a minute, finishing 15th among sophomores in 18:11.
Ewing’s Landyn Loesch finished 30th among juniors in a time of 18:30, tying his best time on this course. He was followed in the junior race by Shazad Singh in 18:51. In the senior race, Ibrahim Songu impressed in his first race at Thompson Park, running 18:34 for 35th place. Iain Walker scored a medal in the freshman race, taking 14th place in 11:37.
Hamilton West’s fastest finisher was Michael Dentini, who finished 33rd in the sophomore race with a time of 19:00. The Hornets haven’t had anyone break 19:00 at Thompson Park since 2017, and Dentini came within a second of that on his first try.
Nottingham’s 5K crew was led by junior Matthew Alvarez in 19:25 and sophomore debutante Michael Julian in 19:35. In the freshman 2-mile race, Gabriel Toure medaled with a nice 18th-place finish in 11:49.
Hopewell Valley rested most of their varsity runners but gave some of their newer runners a chance to experience Thompson Park’s hills. Declan Curley impressed in the freshman race by running 11:11 for 5th place, which was the highest finish by any Mercer County boy in any race.
Girls
There were fewer Mercer County girls competing at Thompson Park on Saturday, but the few that did race still delivered some awesome results.
Wilberforce’s Stella Blanchard continued her historic breakout season by placing 4th in the junior race with a time of 19:29, a massive course PR. She’s now one of just five currently active Mercer County girls who have gone sub-19:30 at Thompson Park. Also on that list is Lawrence’s Izzy Meth, who finished right behind Blanchard on Saturday with a time of 19:30. That was an excellent result and a big step forward for the junior Meth, who is still building up after a late start to the XC season.
Hopewell Valley rested most of their varsity runners except Maddie LaChance, who continued her upward trend this season with a finish of 19th in 22:23. Her freshman teammate Cecelia Carsky-Wilson also earned a medal in her two-mile race, placing 16th in 14:07. A little further back in that race, Nottingham’s Natalie Wiebesiek impressed in her very first XC invitational, finishing 27th in a time of 14:50.