The Cross Country Running season is in full swing here in Anchorage, and the runners of Dimond had a lot to say about their season, and running in general. The Dimond girls Cross Country team had a strong showing at Regions and ended up qualifying for state. Although the boys team did not muster up enough strength to pull out a state-qualifying position, they still had a great race to finish out the season. Senior and varsity runner Katie Hall was looking forward to “Beastin’ it out” during regions. She believes that she is part of a strong girl’s team at Dimond, and says that if they put in the hard work, they should be able to achieve great things. Freshman Callum Toohey, also a varsity runner, was looking forward to regions as well. He says that Coach Nate Normandin “Pushes us all really hard, but in the end, we know that it’s worth it.” With only two weeks left to prepare for regions, Junior Kerrick Eagle was still looking forward to improving his times. Although his personal record was already a ravishing time, with 18 minutes and 4 second for a 5k race, he was striving to knock off a couple more seconds before regions came along. When asked about their favorite races of the year, both Sophomore Taral Clayton and Sophomore Ben Froehlich replied with, “I liked the bucket races, because it was short.” Hall also mentioned she enjoyed the bucket races, however, for a different reason. She said, “The bucket races were my favorite because it was a very close race and it was pretty exciting.” Junior runner Kiel Kenning was also very excited about a race just a couple of weekends ago. He ran his first varsity race, and mentions that it was “So nerve wracking,” and that, “walking up to the starting line was a little scary, and it got even scarier when the starting gun went off.” One of the top 10 girl runners in the state right now, Amelia Henessy, a Junior, says that her favorite race of the year is the Skyview Invitational because “We get to travel together as a team and it is a lot of fun to hang out with everyone.” Many of the runners talked about how running was nerve wracking, but it was still a great sport to try to set goals and achieve them. Sophomore runner Holly Andrus says that she enjoys working her hardest to achieve goals. Normandin, who was a runner on the Dimond Cross Country team when Dimond won a state title in 1998, not only feels that it is necessary for his runners to work on becoming better runners, but he also wants to see them become better people. He wants all of his runners to be competitive and learn to enjoy running. Most of the runners said that they joined the team to stay in shape for other various sports such as hockey and soccer. However, one runner, Kenning, said that he liked doing it for the food. He mentioned that there is a lot of food at the end of races that the runners get to enjoy, and that the team has a spaghetti feed before every one of their meets. He also says that he mainly enjoys it “Because it is a great time to hang out with friends, like Kerrick Eagle and Matt Froehlich who are my best friends.” In addition, he also said, “All of the pain is worth it in the end.”