A busy weekend of cross country produced quite a few outstanding performances by our Bay State athletes. For this week’s HOKA Athletes of the Week, we’d like to recognize Westford Academy’s Jack Graffeo and Oliver Ames Katie Sobieraj as our respective male and female recipients.
Graffeo became our first runner to break the 15-minute barrier for 5K this season with his victory in the Large School race at the Bob Glennon Twilight Invitational. The WA senior clocked a winning time of 14:57.7 at the Cape Cod Fairgrounds, posting a nearly 30 victory over Pablo Tejedor Meyers of Brookline. who secured the runner-up spot with a time of 15:26.6.
Sobieraj found victory at the 62nd annual Catholic Memorial Invitational on Saturday. The OA senior broke away from the pack after the midway point and was all alone at the finish, which she crossed in a time of 18:52.0. Finishing a very close second for this honor was Cambridge Rindge & Latin’s Aoife Shovlin. The Falcons’ standout was ninth in the Eastern States Championship at the Manhattan College XC Invitational. She covered the 2.5-mile layout at Van Corlandt Park in a crisp 14:59.0.
