Fitz Laurie Leads HP Varsity To Another Quad Meet Sweep!

Highland Park ran its second Quad Meet at Maine West with a slightly redesigned course that included a hill. The team on both levels hoped to have tight packs again and win the scored Dual Meet against each competing school.

The Giants once again only had freshmen competing in the Frosh-Soph 2.1 mile race. Jason Polydoris and Erik Anderson went with the leaders early in the race. Polydoris battled right with the top runners while Anderson was hanging on just a little back from them. In the end Polydoris took 3rd (12:50), 8 seconds out of 2nd place. Anderson battled back to finish just 2 seconds back of a Vernon Hills runner to take 5th place (13:06). These two continue to show great toughness and maturity in their racing. Following their strong finish the next pack came in led by Tyler Carlson (9th place, 13:24). He was followed closely by Max Friedman (12th place, 13:31) and Jason Werneth (13th place, 13:32). Adding Werneth to this chase pack continues to improve the strength of this freshmen team. Next in was Evan Diethrich (18th place, 13:54) with a strong pack of three not far behind. That pack included Nathan Kornberg (20th 14:05), Levi Pasikov (21st place, 14:07), and Chance Martin (22nd, 14:08). Martin was another runner that moved up to a new pack that will again make the team much stronger. Jack Levine had a strong race to finish in 27th place (14:25) while Ari Kaden also finished in the top 40 to take 37th place in 14:57.

The freshmen once again lost to Vernon Hills (34-21) but beat Maine West (18-42) and Glenbrook North (20-37). It will be exciting to see what this freshmen squad can do at the conference meet when they are just racing against other freshmen.

In the Varsity Race, the Giants top 4 once again went to the front and pushed the pace with the number one runner from Vernon Hills. Senior Fitz Laurie led the race early, but senior Nate Amster took control of the race midway and tried to break away from the Vernon Hills runner. Laurie and junior Jose Reyes stayed close throughout this stretch. Senior Alec Glazier was with the pack early, but faded back after rolling his ankle and falling just past the halfway point of the race. Eventually, Laurie moved back to the front and started to pull away as he raced with tremendous confidence. Laurie won the race in 15:52 while Reyes passed the Vernon Hills kid down the final stretch to take 2nd in 16:00. Amster raced tough to finish 4th place in 16:05, just 3 seconds behind the Vernon Hills runner that had finished 1st in the last Quad Meet. Glazier gutted out the final part of the race to still take 7th place (16:58) despite the painful ankle. The team was without junior Jordy Mazza for this meet so senior Sebastian Arias was the 5th man taking 14th place in 17:39. The top 7 was rounded out by juniors Richard Heller (21st place, 18:39) and Jack Schulman (27th place, 19:10).

The varsity once again swept the meet beating Vernon Hills (20-36), Maine West (18-40), and Glenbrook North (20-35). That makes it 13 straight Quad Meet sweeps for the Giants! This equals 39 Dual Meet wins in a row! Now that the team got the job done in the quad meets, it is focused on winning a 3rd straight CSL North Conference Championship!