2018 brings good news and bad news for Buchanan's girls. The good news: the Bears return Corie Smith and Meagen Lowe, their star front-runners that finished 1-2 in the Division 1 state meet last fall. The bad news: they graduated a lot of their depth from the squad that placed 2nd as a team (their 4-7 runners, to be specific). Good news: track season brought us evidence of solid improvement across their top 7. Lowe posted 4:48 and 10:26, while Smith ran 4:56 & 10:21; Amanda Dolberg appears to have taken a big step forward; Morgan Hutchinson looks ready to move into the top 5, and Rachel Culver showed that she could be in the top 7 as well. Bad news: that still leaves Buchanan pretty thin, and in need of a strong summer to fill in the gaps (especially between Dolberg and the rest of the top 7). One more piece of good news: this program has been among California's best all-around at year-to-year improvement in cross country, whether you look at 5K or 3 Mile times. Adding it all up, I expect Buchanan to be very good, but it's unlikely they will be as good as they were in 2017 - which is what you would expect for any team losing 4 seniors.
| RANK | TIME | ATHLETE/TEAM | GRADE | MEET DATEPLACE |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 17:05.30 | 2020 | ||
| 2 | 17:18.30 | 2019 | ||
| 3 | 18:29.30 | 2020 | ||
| 4 | 20:08.80 | 2021 | ||
| 5 | 21:12.00 | 2020 | ||
| 6 | 21:15.10 | 2021 | ||
| 7 | 22:08.80 | 2020 |
Team Statistics:
- 5K Improvement Rating: 6th
- 3 Mile Improvement Rating: 2nd
- 5K Returning Rankings: 24th
- 3 Mile Returning Rankings: 16th
- 3200 Returning Rankings: 15th
- 1600 Returning Rankings: 10th