The McClatchy Lions have once again amazed us as they raced phenomenally on Wednesday at the Metro League Championships at North Laguna Creek Park in Elk Grove.
The Lions have been taking wins after wins the whole season and even when they don’t they keep their heads held high! There were many incredible races run that day including many of the team’s injured players being able to come out and run an excellent race.
The frosh/soph girls and boys teams took a big W, placing first. Along with the varsity boys placing first and the varsity girls placing second. A quick shoutout to Hugh Heyer who gave the crowd a thrilling show as he raced to pass another runner in front of him as he crossed the finish line. Joy McDaniel was recruited by the team’s coach, Coach Watkins, to run in the frosh/soph race due to the team not having enough frosh/soph girls to compete. She led the team to their first-place win!
As said earlier many of the team’s injured runners came out to race. Jax Leon, a senior at McClatchy, has been running cross country since seventh grade. He has been suffering from shin splints and has been out of the running game for practically the entire season. Only starting back training two and a half weeks ago and racing his first race this season at Metro Champs, Jax ran an incredible race.
“So you’ve been injured for basically the entire season, but you came back strong! How are you feeling?”
“I feel pretty good, I mean it’s lower than what I expected. I’ve only had two workouts and since I’ve been back I’ve only been running for about two and a half weeks now. Also, I think for it being my first real race of the season with minimal training I couldn’t ask for much more.”
“That’s wild that you’re already back to racing after such a short training period, amazing. I know you’re a senior and this is probably not how you wanted the season to go, but how do you feel going into subsections and possibly qualifying for sections?”
“Well I mean the team is looking really strong this year and we have a lot of good depth and a lot of fast guys in varsity. So I’m pretty confident we’re gonna make it to sections.”
“So am I! Thank Jax for your time and keep training.”
Chela Cobb, also a senior at McClatchy, has been running cross country for all four years. She is the treasurer of the student body board, which can be a really time-consuming job.
“This is your last metro champs and you went out and crushed it. How do you think you did?”
“I think I did good under the circumstances. I’m sick and didn’t run all last week because i was busy with planning homecoming. So I think I killed it!”
“Yes, girl you did amazing! How did you feel after your race? Do you feel like you were kicking enough at the end?”
“I think my kick was average. I’ve certainly had a better kick, but right now my throat is hurting. Overall I think I’m feeling good about my race”
“As you should, you did really well!”
Metro League Championships was not the only big event the team was celebrating. The team celebrated their fellow senior lions as it was their senior night. The seniors were Jaime Garcia, Jillian Palmer, Claire Mills, Jax Leon, Chela Cobb, and new French exchange student Maëlys Garros.
The seniors ran their last metro champs beautifully and the whole team came together to honor them! We look forward to seeing how the team will do this Saturday at Subsections, but from how the champs went, they got this in the bag. Go Lions!