Cross Country Scrimmage

By Gretta Becay

 

A collaboration between the City of Byron and the Byron School District’s Cross Country Team generated a unique scrimmage location for a practice meet between Byron and Pine Island on Aug. 22. 

Byron Cross Country Coaches Tom O’Leary, Caleb Troe, Tom Woo, and helper Jason Reeve hosted the scrimmage with runners from Byron and visiting team Pine Island at the Byron Community Recreation Complex at 1650 Fourth St. NE. 

Tom Ricke, Byron Public Works Director, and Head Coach Tom O’Leary came up with the idea of having the scrimmage at BCRC. The group set up a track using orange cones around the four baseball fields, up and down the hill to the east of the parking lot and, and through the grassy area near the all-inclusive playground equipment and pavilion. They were thus able to come up with a 2.5-kilometer route for the older students to run twice for a 5 K race and a one-mile track for the younger students to use.

In this photo, Coach O’Leary explains the route to the Byron students.

It was definitely a win/win, said the two men. The site has plenty of parking and restrooms available and the facility happened to be empty on a beautiful Thursday morning in late August for the scrimmage. Coach O’Leary explained that trial meets like this give athletes a chance to experience what the starting procedures would feel like, and how the students must maneuver around and through other runners. There were 110 total competitors, said O’Leary. 

“We really appreciate the city partnering with us to make an event like this possible for our athletes,” he said.