Any doubts that Crown Point junior Genesio Christofanelli may have had were put to rest during the Bulldogs’ preseason camp.
“I had my breakthrough: I ran about 70 miles that week,” he said. “And I’ve been up at 75 miles for the last few weeks now. I’m feeling really confident in my training.”
After battling shin splints that negatively affected his 2017 postseason, Christofanelli has returned to the form he had during his breakout freshman year. This season, Cristofanelli has won all three of his races, including in 15 minutes, 23 seconds at Saturday’s Rudy Skorupa Invitational at Lake Central.
Two seasons ago, Christofanelli led the Bulldogs to the state meet, placing 36th overall (16:28) there. But he couldn’t recreate that postseason success as a sophomore when he developed shin splints after the Duneland Athletic Conference Meet on Oct. 1.
“I was on the elliptical for all of October,” Christofanelli said.
It affected his track season, too. Christofanelli said he ran about 100 miles between November and February, well below his normal work rate. But by the end of track season, Christofanelli said he started to feel like his old self again.
That feeling has carried over into cross country season and coach Keith Iddings has noticed.
“He looks so great in practice,” Iddings said. “You’ll see him doing the workout and it looks almost effortless. I’m excited for him. He puts in so much work and isn’t having any of the frustrations he dealt with last year.”
Christofanelli opened this season on Aug. 11 by winning the Crown Point Invitational in 16:27. He followed with a first-place time of 15:57 at the LaPorte’s Jack Bransford Invitational on Aug. 18.
After falling a bit shy of his targeted split times in LaPorte, though, Christofanelli made no such plans for the Skorupa Invite.
“This week, I just wanted to see what I could do,” he said. “There wasn’t really any strategy. I just went out fast.”
Crown Point won Saturday’s meet with 45 points, ahead of Highland (55) and Lake Central (72).
Gilliana’s new role: Junior Ava Gilliana is the only Valparaiso upperclassman returning from the top seven runners who ran at last year’s semistate. With a large influx of freshmen this season, she spent the summer preparing to set the tone for her teammates.
“You have to lead them in the right direction and get their mental state where it needs to be,” Gilliana said. “We have a really young team. Without as many seniors and juniors to learn from, that makes it harder.”
She leads by example, too. Gilliana won the girls race at Lake Central, leading the Vikings to a first-place score of 30.
Bearcats sweep: Coming off a strong showing by both teams at the Bearcat Invitational on Aug. 18, Wheeler kept its strong start going with the boys and girls teams finishing first at Saturday’s Gavit Invitational held at Riverside Park.
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Wheeler also produced both individual winners: sophomore Hailey Orosz won in 20:18 and junior Hudson Hall won in 17:07, with classmate Stevie Franczek in second at 17:10.
“It’s all coming together — a mix of talent and hard work,” Wheeler coach Luis Guillen said. “We had a good summer of training, they believe in each other and they’re buying into what the coaches are preaching.”
Dave Melton is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.