Their sport is your sport’s punishment, who wants to get up at 6am and go run 3-4 miles each day. Who wants to go run when you don’t have to. Not everyone has what it takes to compete in the cross country team. The cross country team achieved a 1st place victory in the meet against Killeen. “It felt good, we accomplished something that we worked for as a team,” senior Keshawn Jackson said.

Senior Michael Lumpkin runs on varsity.  “It was a great experience, I was glad I got to show my coach how much I’ve improved over the summer,” Lumpkin said. “The varsity team had a total number of eight runners that finished in the top 10.”

Like many students in varsity, Lumpkin is a leader for the team of seventy five. “It feels amazing , having your whole team depend on you and look up to you is just amazing, and leading your team to success is just great,” Lumpkin said. The team practices every morning and they have a spaghetti dinner party the night before a meet. Depending on how the team does determines if they go to the playoffs. So far, the team has placed 1st in Killeen, and 1st in Pflugerville. The team practices at Old Settlers Park in Round Rock, at Stony Point high school, and sometimes they are assigned a free run where they run to a certain destination, whether it’s a donut shop or a gas station. Usually, newcomers on the team start off with 2 miles at the beginning of their practices and from there they build up. Varsity players are given the job to help the newcomers on the team and lead them to where they are supposed to go when they are running.
The team also trains over breaks when school is not in session. Even if it rains, the team is still out there training. Depending if lightning and thunder appear, the meet and practice will get cancelled. After a meet, the team celebrates going out to eat or going to a hang out spot. “Last week after our meet, we went to the outlet mall,” Jackson said. “But more likely than not, we’ll usually go out to eat after a meet.”
Cross Country season begins at the end of July and the season ends in early November. Varsity players come on a little earlier to train and to get back with the system. Newcomers and junior varsity players start a couple weeks before school or the first day of school. When asked what made him join cross country, Jackson said “I want to become a better runner, get in better shape, get more athletic, and to be more fit.” The cross country team’s next meet is regionals, and will take place on October 22nd, at Lynn Creek Park.