MySportsResults.com – News – Top New England Teams Descend on 41st Wickham Park XC Invitational

By Senior Correspondent Marty Ogden, Editing, Graphics, Video Production by Ron Knapp

RESULTS

Two changes happened this year that made the 41st Wickham Park XC Invitational one of the most competitive in recent memories. The Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur fell on its traditional Columbus Day weekend date and the New England Council decision to move its championship back to Connecticut made this meet much more attractive to teams from all over the northeast. One hundred and sixteen high school boys and girls teams and over 3,000 athletes traversed the trails on Wickham Park’s 5000m course in six varsity races, five Junior Varsity races, two freshman races and even two middle school events that lasted from 9:00am to 5:30 pm. The officials, led by meet director Bill Baron, his family and friends, certainly put in a full day. 

Boys Large School Varsity Race

RACE VIDEO

The Rhode Island powerhouse, Bishop Hendricken won the large school race over Hanover, NH by a score of 71 to 82. Hanover was 4th last year at the New England championships in Maine with the Rhode Island school taking 8th place. Staples, whose ten year streak for qualifying for New Englands was broken last year, was third in the large school race with 128 points. 

Bethel’s Evan Bureau, who was just recovering from an injury that forced him to cross train for a couple of weeks, surprised himself by easily winning the race in 16:04, the 2nd fastest time of the day. His time is not only five seconds faster than last year when he was 12th at the State Open, he moved up to run the 66th fastest time on the course since 2006. He held off Samuel Zwick-Lavins of Staples by seven seconds. The Wrecker is one of the most improved runners in the field, knocking off almost a minute from his State Open time last year when he was fifth.

Evan Bureau Interview

Boys Medium School Varsity Race

Race Video

In the Boys Medium school race, E.O. Smith had the fastest combined time for all CT schools and just missed their school record by 17 seconds with their time of 1:24.52. They outlasted CCC rival Rocky Hill by a score of 55-88.

The honor of the fastest time of the day went to Sean Gray of Portsmouth (RI) who was 4th in the Rhode Island Cross Country Championships last year. He went right to the front and held a sizable lead the entire race, finishing in 15:47, a time that makes him the 28th fastest individual on the course. Finishing in the runner-up spot was Brendan Cook of E.O. Smith. He was barely under…