Callum Pilgrim Leads Royals at Sunfair Meet

Yakima, WA, Oct. 7—Valley Royal and WJ Mouat cross country runner
Callum Pilgrim had had an outstanding performance at the Sunfair High School Invitational cross country meet held Saturday in Yakima, Washington.

Pilgrim, an all round athlete who is pursuing cross country running for the first time, placed second in her flight 5-race held over a very hilly three mile course at Lincoln Park. The grade 10 athlete held the lead until the last 400-meters of her race but was eventually passed by Idaho’s Emily Callahan.

Pilgrim’s time of 18:26 was the third best performance of the day amongst the girl’s competitions and the second fastest time ever in the flight five race. Pilgrim stated to her coach that she knew exactly where and why she lost the race but felt that the experience would be valuable to her development as a quality runner.

Alexandra Siemens, who also attends Mouat, ran a strategic race in the flight 7 race and kept pace with the leaders over the first half of the course but during the final kilometer she had some trouble and had to settle for a third place finish.

Peter Mitchell, yet another Mouat runner, had a good performance and
placed third in flight 1 of the boy’s competition. Mitchell, a grade 11 athlete from Mouat and in his first season of cross country running, had a competitive run and finished with a time of 17:49.

Other solid performances for the Royals saw 13-year old Gabrielle MacGregor place ninth in the girls’ junior varsity run, Jennifer Kell (grade 10) came second in flight 2, Ashley Heisler was fifth in flight 1, Erica Johnson was eighth in the girl’s junior varsity run and Delaney Chapman was second in the grade 10 girl’s competition.