Both the Mt. Greylock boys and girls Cross Country teams wrapped up their regular season with the Berkshire County Invitational on Saturday, October 26. Western Mass is now just two weeks away and will take place at Northfield Mountain in Erving, Ma.

On October 2, the girls beat Taconic in their first race on their home course. Fifteen out of the top seventeen runners represented Mt. Greylock, with Mount Greylock sophomore Kate Swann coming in almost a minute ahead of the field. The boys lost to both Taconic and Monument, although Mount Greylock eighth-grader Ollie Swabey finished second. 

When Swann was asked about the team’s previous races, she said, “they’ve gone well. There’s good competition which is really fun … so it’s nice to look forward to racing.”

On October 10, at Hoosac Valley High School, Swann beat Pittsfield’s Kellie Harrington by two tenths of a second. With help from the photo finish, the Mountie girls beat Pittsfield and Waconah by a large margin. The boys also beat Pittsfield, with a 17:22.17 finish from Swabey, 27 seconds in front of the second-place runner. 

At the Burnt Hills Invitational, the MG girls took the win with important finishes from Swann, Jacqueline Wells, Miriam Bakija, Sophia Mele, and Ainsley Abel. Helping the boys team to a third-place finish was Swabey, Charlie McWeeny, Parker Winters, Corban Miller, and Patrick Aliberti. 

At their last home race of the season, the Greylock boys lost by only three points to rival Lenox, but beat Lee by 27 points. Swabey finished second, and the boys team finished with 8 out of the top 20 runners. The girls beat both Lenox and Lee, finishing with Swann, Wells, and eighth-graders Erin Keating, Cecilia Malone and Grace Malone in the top 10. Swann finished 47 seconds in front of Harrington (PHS) and almost a minute before other top runners from PHS and Lenox. 

Going into their Berkshire County Invitational, Swann said, “I think that we’re going to do really well as a team there. Lenox is definitely pretty close…but I think that if we work really hard, we can definitely do well.” Swann was right. The Greylock girls went on to clinch both Junior Varsity and Varsity wins at the county championships, while the boys finished with a first-place finish from their JV team and a third-place finish, behind Lenox and Monument Mountain, from the Varsity squad. 

“I think our goals are to try and win Western Mass and States,” Swann said, “but there are definitely good teams, so it’ll still be a challenge. It’s not going to come easy, so we’re going to have to work hard, but I think we can do it.”