By Chris Hagan
Review Staff Writer
The Lake Orion girls? cross country team has been to running what the Buick Grand National was to hot rods.
From a distance it’s not all that intimidating, but when tested it surprises you and continues to surprise you.
And that has been Coach Debi McDonald’s focus leading up to Saturday’s Oakland County Championships at Kensington Metro Park. Lake Orion placed fourth with a score of 198, beating Rochester Adams by two points.
Junior Bellina Gaskey had an individual 5k run time of 19:48 earning her 20th out of 230 runners while senior Emily Fluent finished 20 seconds after Gaskey placing 32nd.
McDonald’s expectations were exceeded.
‘I predicted fifth to seventh place and Adams had been beating us throughout the month of September,? McDonald said. ‘We just have a solid group and a lot of them ran a personal record for that course.?
Birmingham Seaholm (54) won the tournament making it their fifth straight county tournament won by the Maples. Milford (65) placed second while Waterford Mott earned third with a score of 128.
The Lake Orion girls have been steadily climbing on the leader boards through the season and have taken second in their last two meets beating out Oxford and Rochester Adams.
‘They’re trusting the system, not doubting any of the workouts and they’re not going into meets with negative attitudes,? McDonald said. ‘My goal was to steadily increase throughout the season making it about higher mileage work in the beginning and later we can work on speed.?
The girls have a busy couple of weeks rapidly approaching as they travel to Oxford on Friday for an invitational and the OAA division meet is Thursday, October 22 at Bloomer Park in Rochester. Their hard work will be put to the test on Halloween when they travel to Anchor Bay for regionals.
‘I tell my girls, ‘the season doesn’t end October 1st? so I’m anticipating third at the regional meet,? she said. ‘We kind of stay hidden in the beginning of the season and our top four girls have a really good grouping together.?