Local runners make solid showing at CC meet

Nearly all of the best runners in the city competed in the annual Mayor’s Cup Cross Country championships on Sunday at Van Cortlandt Park. The best runners from the PSAL, Catholic High School Athletic Association (CHSAA) and independent schools (AAIS) filled 10 different heats that went off through the rolling hills of the park on a pleasant early fall afternoon.

Individuals and teams from the Riverdale area competed admirably against their inter-borough opponents and recorded some top times.

DeWitt Clinton junior Aaliyah Regg Wajid finished second in the 2.5-mile girls championship race in a time of 15:34.31. Wajid, who won the varsity race at the Mayor’s Cup as a freshman and finished second last year, easily beat her times from those events but finished well behind winner Lisa Fajardo of Bishop Kerney, who clocked in at 15:10.10.

Wajid has now finished on the podium in both of her races this season after winning the PSAL Group Run at Van Cortlandt Park on Sept. 27.

Her teammates, Amber Ayala and Derica Pitters, finished 20th and 21st, respectively, and the Lady Governors took fifth place as a team with an average time of 17:27.97.

Bronx Science finished 13th in the 19-team field, with senior Lili Tobias pacing the team with a time of 17:37.08.

The Bronx Science boys did not qualify for the championship race, but they dominated the varsity race, with senior William Yarinsky and sophomore Jacob Solomon finishing first and second, respectively, out of 480 runners.

Yarinsky finished the 2.5-mile race in 14:02.79 and Solomon in 14:04.68 as the Wolverines cruised to the team title over Beacon High. Junior Michael Webber came in ninth place (14:30.59).

The David A. Stein Riverdale/Kingsbridge Academy (M.S./H.S. 141) placed eighth as a team in the Varsity race, with Joshua Roman (28th place, 15:05.75) leading the pack, while Thomas Harvey, who placed 45th in 15:27.63, paced Riverdale Country.

Horace Mann finished 13th, Fieldston was 23rd and Kennedy Campus was 48th in the 67-team field. Fieldston’s Michael Consuelos ran the course in 14:53.48 to finish 19th.

In the girls’ Varsity race, Horace Mann finished 11th, but the top individual performance went to Riverdale Country’s Cameron Phaffle, who finished 50th in a time of 19:52.80.

Bronx Science’s Ally Freifeld won the 1.5-mile freshman race in 11:08.28, Natasha Stamler was third in 11:39.57 and the Wolverines won the team title with an average time nearly 40 seconds faster than second-place Port Richmond.