Glacier Bears take first in final regional track meet

The Haines Glacier Bears High School Cross Country teams took home first place at the Region V championship meet over the weekend. The victory was a bookend to a season where schools competed against each other from a distance. 

For the Region V meet on Saturday, Haines runners submitted their race times after completing a 5k course at the Valley of the Eagles Golf Course. The times were compared with the times of other high school athletes running in similar 5k courses across Southeast Alaska. 

Hannah Boron is a senior and one of the team captains. She said wet weather made for some difficult conditions. 

“After a torrential downpour, it was very marshy. It was essentially running in a light pool the entire time. It was all flat so it was unfamiliar to us in the sense that it had no hills,” Boron said.

Despite the challenges, several runners broke personal records. 

The boys team took home first place, beating seven other schools from around the region. Sophomore Luke Davis finished third out of all the participants with a time of 17:57. He said running a virtual race is difficult because you can’t see the competitors you are racing against. 

“There was this guy who beat me by like 12 seconds or something. I feel like if I was running in a race with him, I would be seeing him just a little ways ahead of me,” Davis said. “I might have pushed it a little harder, run a little faster, maybe beaten the guy.”

The girls team dominated the podium. Sophomore Mackenzy Dryden finished first with a time of 19:57, followed by Sophomore Grace Long with a time of 20:41 and Senior Hannah Boron with a time of 21:13. Their team also took first overall. 

Dryden said she was grateful for the support from the community during the meet at the golf course.

“That’s definitely another thing that motivates us to go even faster because we have our families and our community watching us and we just want to do our best when they’re there cheering us on,” Dryden said.

The Glacier Bears won the state cross country championships last year for Division III. This year the team will not be able to compete at the championships in Anchorage. 

The Haines Borough School District’s travel policies for athletics have become stricter due to the pandemic. The cross country team cannot compete in communities with active cases, and Anchorage is currently a hotspot for COVID-19. Coach Jordan Baumgartner said it was tough not being able to compete. 

“With the circumstances this year we couldn’t go to state. It was really disappointing for the kids, to say the least, because we have a really good team,” Baumgartner said. “On the competitive side, these kids want to win and they want to be state champions, and it was hard for me as a coach to not give them that opportunity. But we did the best we could and rolled with the punches. 

Baumgartner said that he was grateful to even have a season this year. The team was able to compete in 5 races. Hannah Boron, a senior and team captain, agrees with her coach. 

“Despite the difficulties that have come with COVID, I couldn’t have been happier. We showed through adversity we could still improve and push our limits as athletes,” Boron said.

Click here for the boys and girls results of the Region V championship.