Cross Country Wins Sixth Straight EIL Championship

November 5, 2021—The Winsor School’s Cross Country team won their sixth straight Eastern Independent League (EIL) Championship! The meet, co-hosted by Winsor and Dana Hall, took place at Franklin Park in near-perfect fall weather. 

Winsor was paced by Meg Madison ’24 and placed five scorers in the top 15 finishers. These finishes helped Winsor beat second place finisher Newton Country Day School (NCDS) by a score of 41-60. Meg Madison ’24, Brenna Thomas ’26, Suzanne Pogorelec ’24, Serena Toscani ’25, and Raina Sohur ’23 were all named to the EIL All League team for their top 15 performances in a field of 103 runners.

After completing a season that included two nailbiter wins over NCDS, Winsor entered EILs expecting an extremely competitive race. When the start gun went off, Meg Madison ’24 took an early lead but was closely followed by two NCDS runners. Half a mile into the race, momentum turned—Winsor had five scorers in the top 20 but was losing to NCDS. As the race went on the field shifted with a diverse set of runners moving into the top five and Winsor runners moving up strategically. The season of hills training paid off. On the Bear Cage section, Brenna Thomas ’26 and Suzanne Pogorelec ’24 made a decisive pass ahead of the NCDS #2 and rookie Serena Toscani ’25 and Raina Sohur ’23 moved up in the top 15 ahead of the NCDS #4. These moves put Winsor in firm control of the team race with still a mile to go. Winsor runners held on to finish 1-7-8-11-15 for a decisive win over NCDS who held 6-10-14-16-17 and for the first time all year, Winsor took the lead over NCDS at every position. 

Our next pack started with Zoe Lewis ’22 in 26th and Ryan Fantasia ’24 in 32nd to round out Winsor's top seven and Jacey Jiang '25 and Caitlin Wang '25 working in tandem to finish 36-37 and give Winsor nine runners in the top 40. Iris Shen ’26 finished 60th, Nicole Hwang ’23 70th, Caroline Shin ’23 74th, Ashley Xu ’23 78th, and Nora Furlong ’25 90th in the field of 103 runners.

Next, the team will travel to Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts to compete in the Division 1 New England Cross Country Championships on November 13.