From Track To Cross Country, The School Records Keep Running In!
Having the 1600m, 3200m, and 4x800 school and state records, Marek Butkiewicz is not done collecting the title of being school record holder.
Each year for the past couple years, the Cross Country teams go to DeWitt Michigan to compete in the yearly Michigan Catholic XC Invitational. Every year the Cross Country team has the opportunity to stay overnight at the St. Francis Retreat Center the night before the race. The team gets an advantage because they can complete an easy run on the course before they race on it the next morning. After the run the team gets to eat dinner, bond and have fun.
The Michigan Catholic XC Invitational is renowned for its big downhill finish which always brings excitement as the runners fly down the hill. This year the meet consisted of 15 catholic schools and over 150 athletes from all around Michigan. Leading the mens team this year is captain Marek Butkiewicz who has the fastest time on the team. All last week Marek was dealing with a foot injury which made everyone question if he would even be able to run the day of the race. It was only two days before the race that Marek was cleared by a doctor that he was able to run and compete. Marek ended up getting second overall with a personal best of 16.00 minutes and a new school record! Marek said, “It was surprising and I'm very happy that it opened the season.” The rest of the boys did great as well with PRs from Sean Siems (17:12.09), Alex Dumont (18:40.3), and Colin Gallagher (20:50.4) which helped the boys to get fifth overall, but being first in the D4 division and winning the St. Elizabeth Ann Seton award for placing the highest out of all the D4 schools.
The girls team did great also despite only having five people instead of the usual seven. The girls team were led by captain Kate Van Es (23:11.7) and Brie Seims (22:13.7) who led the womens team to a seventh place finish and also to a win in the D4 division and receive the St. Elizabeth Ann Seton trophy!
The mens and womens Cross Country teams will compete at the Kalamazoo Invite right here in town over at Linden Grove Middle School. The mens team will race first at 5:00 PM followed by the womens team racing at 5:30. Come out and support your Irish XC teams!
