Hastings Girls Cross-Country: Trio Keeps Tradition Alive

For the better part of the last decade, Hastings Cross-Country coach Denis Kiely has nurtured a great deal of individual talent.  He's seen the likes of top-flight long-distance runners such as Nora Howe, Molly Burke--who continued her career at Bucknell--Noelle Considine (Villanova), Kate Hunt, and Kate Greathead cruise through courses and capture first-place finishes. While the individual accolades were nice, lack of student interest and strength in numbers prevented  Kiely from piecing together a deep, loaded team.

Then the tide suddenly turned in 2008, when Yellow Jackets boasted the three-headed speed monster of Howe, Emma Sander, and Emily Polstein.

The lack of strength in numbers, which once had the program fading into a cloud of obscurity, was no more. Kiely has since had a wealth of great runners who have helped launch Hastings into a different level of competition. Though graduation claimed Howe, Sander, Polstein, and junior Lauren Wilt, will be back this season to give competing teams a run for their money, so to speak.  

Sander, an elite long-distance runner who has broken the 20-minute barrier in the 5K, established herself as one of the top 1500-meter and 3,000-meter runners among the section-I small schools in the area. She's chipped away at her 1,500 time, which is now 5:08. She clocked a 5:34 in the mile and recorded a personal best of 19:54 in the three-mile run. She registered a time of 11:12 in the endurance and meddle-testing 3,000-meter race, a harbinger of great things to come in this upcoming season, her last.  

Hastings varsity cross-country practices, both girls and boys, begin at Reynolds Field on Monday, August 23. 

The tradition is intact and respected.

Their daily runs through Hastings' Burke Estate course--created in in fall of 2003--take athletes along the old croton aqueduct, across streams, up steep hills and past tall trees, whose leaves will fall in greater numbers as the season progresses.  

Wilt turned heads two years ago when, as a freshman, she consistently held her own in the front four alongside Howe, Sander, and Polstein.

Wilt was a "pleasant surprise" for Coach Kiely.

Besides talent, she added a deeper level of work ethic and drive, which Kiely believes was invaluable to his team. And the dynamic group never once wilted when their coaches and some of the veterans urged them to grind out a 6 to 7 mile runs and then conclude their workouts with dreaded uphill sprints on South Calumet Avenue. 

Last season was a breakout campaign for Wilt, who in track and field, also clocked a personal record time of 1:47.10 in the 600-meter race and placed 14th in the Westchester County Championships.

Polstein supplemented the long-distance attack with Sander, clocking a personal record of 11:30 in the 3,000 at the Section 1 state qualifier. She, like her teammate Sander, also broke the 20-minute barrier in the 5K and the two could likely create competition in practice and a side-by-side tandem in the races. The two seniors, Polstein and Sander, and junior Wilt will look to live up to Kiely's lofty expectations ever since the program blossomed two years ago.  

For more information about Hastings Cross-County and other fall sports, please call the Athletics office at 914-478-6241.