The following is from a team parent:
CHS Boys Cross Country team with Coach Lisa Morgan
Capping a surprisingly successful season, Columbia fielded a young Varsity Boys Cross Country team in the New Jersey State Group IV Championship on Saturday at Holmdel Park in Holmdel, New Jersey. Group IV includes 70 teams from the largest schools in New Jersey, who competed in various Group IV sectional races this year leading up to Saturday’s championship. Although this hilly and wind-swept 5K (3.1 mile) course challenged the Columbia team, they finished 16th in Group IV, a much stronger position than ever expected at the season’s start in September.
Columbia was again paced by the duo of junior Jared Pangallozzi, who finished 35th out of the top 147 runners in Group IV with a time of 17:01, and sophomore David Ives who placed 45th in 17:08. Finishing out the scoring for Columbia, as the 3rd through 5th runners, were senior Jacob Paul followed by sophomores Tim Depue and Jon Salinardo.
While the Group IV race was the last competition of the season for the Cougars, the varsity team will run one more race – the Foot Locker Cross Country Northeast Regional on Saturday, November 28 at Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx, New York. The upper classmen will run the open section of the race while the sophomores will compete in the under classmen’s division. Thinking ahead to the 2016 cross country season, the Foot Locker race will provide the Cougars with another opportunity to compete against top level runners.
Note: In the accompanying picture (courtesy of Emma Lipsky) is the boys varsity team (Jacob Paul, Gabe Benson, Jared Pangallozzi, David Ives, Tim Depue, Jon Salinardo, and Luke Burke) getting some last minute instruction from Coach Lisa Morgan before the start of the Group IV championship.
