Wachusett Invitational
The only major instate action this weekend will be the Wachusett Invitational out in Holden. Featuring over two dozen high schools and a few middle schools, the Wachusett Invite will be the place to be for your local cross country fix. Featuring three different varsity races based on school size, we should get a great viewing of various top ranked individuals and teams in both the boys and girls races.
The top performer on Saturday could rise from the Varsity C race, as Brandon Hall of Hopedale has looked strong out of the gates this fall. Hall opened up his junior year campaign with a gutsy performance at the Ocean State Invite to run 16:08 and finish 2nd overall. At last week's Frank Kelley Invite, Hall was at the front once again and won the Varsity DII race in 16:21. Also expect fellow Hopedale runner, David Wollensak to be not too far off his teammate, as he too has looked in his first two meets. Hoping to spoil the fun for the Hopedale runners in the Varsity C race will be Nico Agosta of Parker Charter. Agosta proved last fall that he is one of the best in D2 and opened up his season with a solid 16:38 performance in the Championship Race at Ocean State. Due to dominant duo up front for Hopedale, the Blue Devil boys should easily run away with the Varsity C team race.
Moving on up to the Varsity B race, we should expect another clean sweep by the Nashoba duo of Kyle Cloutier and Ryan Gillooly. They have yet to race any big invitationals this fall, but such was the case last year and they easily bested the field. We are definitely interested to see how Cloutier performs, as he had strong track seasons and returns as one of the top D1 runners in the state due to his 18th place finish at last year's All-State Meet. Similar to last year, the Varsity B race will be tight fight between Nashoba and Westborough. Due to the 1-2 punch of Nashoba, we feel that they will squeak out the team victory.
In the Varsity A Race, Josh Newmark and Andrew Kaye of Shrewsbury will be toeing the line in hopes of going 1-2 in Wachusett. Putting up strong season openers at the Amherst Invite, Kaye led the way with his 5th place 16:08 performance, while Newmark was not too far back in 9th with a time of 16:18. Tasked with trying to make sure Shrewsbury doesn't steal the glory on their home turf, Cameron Ford of Wachusett will try and keep it close up front. After a nice start to his season at Amherst, Noah Brazer of Algonquin should also find himself in the lead pack on Saturday. Following the same trend as the Varsity B Race, the team competition will be a close battle between Wachusett and Shrewsbury. On paper, Shrewsbury has a better 1-2, but it drops off a lot to their #3-5 runners. Meanwhile, Wachusett doesn't have that front-runner power, but makes up for it with a very tight 1-5 pack.