The Gilmour Academy boys and girls cross country teams opened their respective postseasons in successful fashion at the OHSAA District Championship held at Madison High School this past weekend.
The girls team won the District title for the 11th straight year while the boys team finished in third place in their District race. With their performances, both teams advanced to the OHSAA Regional Championship this coming weekend.
The GA girls ran well as a team, working close together in nice groups, to top the field at Districts with 35 points. The Lancers placed three runners in the top five and six in the top 16 of the race.
Amy Weybrecht '24 led the Lancers by finishing as the District runner-up in 18:56.54. Clare Valenza '23 and Mary Lombardo '22 finished in third and fifth place overall in 19:00.18 and 19:47.51, respectively.
Kaitlin Rulison '23 (20:49.20), Mia Polisena '22 (20:57.70) and Anna Grossner '23 (21:07.17) finished in 14th, 15th and 16th to help the Gilmour cause.
Ava Moe '22 was the final Lancer runner, taking 28th in 22:09.76.
The Lancer girls continue to sit in third place in the state in the most recent Division III coaches association poll.
After not qualifying for the OHSAA Regional meet last season, the Gilmour boys pledged to have a different result this season. Despite missing a key piece to the team that woke up ill Saturday morning, the Lancers made sure they delivered on that goal.
The Gilmour boys placed third among 11 complete teams after finishing in sixth place of nine teams at the same event last season.
Michael Piccirrillo '24 led a trio of Lancers among the top 15 in the race. He placed 11th in a time of 17:37.85.
Tim Papczun '24 (17:43.85) and Scott Vergilii '23 (17:47.09) were close behind Piccirrillo, finishing in 13th and 14th places.
Andrew Lewis '23 (18:28.58) and Liam Flynn '25 (19:27.48) rounded out the scoring contingent for Gilmour, taking 21st and 37th places. The effort from Flynn was especially noteworthy as he found out he was racing only a couple of hours ahead of the start time.
Bryce Beard '25 (19:56.65) and Jordan Shininger '25 (20:06.12) also contested the event for Gilmour.
The improvement from last year was clearly evident when looking at GA's top four finishers, all of whom also ran in the District meet at the same course last season.
Piccirrillo and Papczun each took over 90 seconds off his time from last year while Vergilii was nearly 80 seconds faster.
Lewis' improvmement was massive as he shaved over three minutes off his time from Districts last year, which helped him place 37 spots higher at the event than he did in 2020.
Both the GA boys and girls will compete at the OHSAA Regional Championship at Boardman High School this coming Saturday, Oct. 30.