Last Friday’s cross country practice wasn’t like every other day for the Panthers.

In their second week of practice and with about 50 percent of the team being freshmen on both the men and women’s sides, the Panthers are having to do things a little differently, said head cross country coach Geoff Masanet.

“It’s a little rough, right now,” Masanet said. “People are tired and worn out, trying to get used to the practice routine.”

Masanet held practice in the pool on Friday afternoon to ease some of the stress and give the athletes a break from the heat.

Masanet said they did some aerobic work with the kick boards, as well as some aqua jogging.

“But mainly, we just swim,” he said. “It is not much of a workout but water is therapeutic and it takes away from the everyday pounding of running.”

Freshman Harrison Bueno said that the pool workout was a nice break but it was a little too boring for him.

“In the pool, you are just going up and down, up and down,” Bueno said. “It is nice to be able to run outside on the streets and trails and get to see different things.”

Crystal Lake contributes big to Panthers roster

Not only is half of the team composed of freshmen but this year one-fourth of the freshmen are from the same town.

Harrison Bueno, Derek Erickson, Ryan Hoklas and Caitlin Napoleoni are all from three different high schools in Crystal Lake.

Bueno and Hoklas are from Prairie Ridge, Erickson is from Central, and Napoleoni is from South High School.

Masanet knows both the Central and South coaches from growing up in Crystal Lake and attending South High School.

“There was just a lot of different connections there and Central has been one of the better programs in the state for the past 10 years, on the men’s side particularly,” Masanet said. “It has always sort of been a goal of mine to get some kids from my hometown.”

Napoleoni said she liked that Masanet was very familiar with Crystal Lake.

“He would call me and that is what we would talk about, all the good places to run,” Napoleoni said. “It was nice to know that he related and knew the places I was talking about.”

Freshmen adjust to travel

This weekend will be the first of many out of town, weekend trips for the Panthers, who will travel to Nashville, Tenn., for the Belmont Invitational.

Sophomore Erin O’Grady said she remembers traveling is somewhat of an adjustment along with the change in pace and distance.

O’Grady said with the girls there is only about a 200 meter difference in distance so that is not as big of a change as it is for the boys, but traveling four hours every weekend is.

“In high school, four hours was our furthest drive ever for a meet and that was a huge deal,” Napoleoni said.