By Julius Pak
A week after finishing second and third, respectively, at the state championship meet, All-State runners Cami Chapus ’12 and Amy Weissenbach ’12 ran at the Foot Locker Regionals on the five-kilometer course at Mt. San Antonio College. Chapus was seconds away from winning the state title for the third year in a row.
Since the top 10 contestants of the 145-girl seeded race at Regionals qualify to run at the Foot Locker Nationals race, Chapus earned herself a ticket to Morley Field at San Diego’s Balboa Park with a ninth place finish.Her average mile time during the race was just under six minutes.
Weissenbach missed the cut, finishing above twenty minutes in 86th place.
At the National race in San Diego Dec. 10, Chapus represented the West region of the United States as a team with the other qualifiers from Regionals.
In addition, Chapus wore a uniform from a Nike summer camp instead of her school outfit, since CIF rules prohibit the use of school insignia on uniforms after the state meet.
Chapus cut 26 seconds off of her Regionals time to finish in 22nd place, the fifth fastest for the West team and second fastest for any girl from California.
This run was the last cross country race of her high school career although Chapus will continue running in the spring on the track and field team and next year at Stanford.
“I think going into this race I was a lot less nervous than any of my other races and I was more excited,” Chapus said. “I think I just really wanted to end on a good note and be positive during the race. Even though I know I could have placed better, I’m still really happy with the race because it’s the best I’ve felt in the last month.”
Chapus has been recovering from a bronchitis infection that affected her meets at state and Foot Locker Regionals.
Along with Aaron de Toledo ’12, Chapus, was named a November Athlete of the Month by the Student-Athletic Advisory Committee for her achievements in cross country in the past month.
De Toledo, part of last year’s CIF-winning boys’ cross country team, finished in sixth place at state, the best individual performance by a boy in the history of the program.
