AHS Girls and Boys Cross Country opened their season at the Duane Rau Invitational on Thursday, September 1. This is our traditional opening race every year. We like to repeat courses to see how we improve over the course of the year from training. The teams stepped up to the challenge of a hilly course! The boys team came home with a 1st place trophy! They made huge moves over the last mile of the race to prove their strength and determination. Senior Mitchell Day was the overall winner of the race running a 15:49. He is one of 2 people to get under 16:00 minutes on this particular course in 30 years. He also holds the course record with a 15:43 performed in mid-September of 2015. Filling out the top 5 were Sophmore Aden Smith, Sophmore Josh Smith running a career best time, Senior Isaac Cross and Senior Dallin Toth. The girls team came home with a 2nd place trophy! They were bested by Sault Ste. Marie. Senior Alayna Nugent led our pack running a 21:50. Close behind her was Junior Destiney Wirgau running a career best of 21:52. Filling in the rest of the points for Alpena were freshmen Anna Young, Kaylee Rondeau and Molly Dickenson. Both teams ran really well. We knew the hill was going to be a challenge but we prepared in advance to race it. We lost a lot of people at the top of the hill. We also worked on taking strong corners this week which proved to give them a mental edge. We are building confidence and looking forward to running at the Lancer Invitational at Bullock Creek on Saturday, September 10!