CROSS COUNTRY: Cloquet girls embrace the State experience

Cloquet sent two sophomore girls, Harmony Tracy and Amelia Allen, to Saturday's Minnesota Class AA Cross Country State Championships.

The two had a successful season, despite it being Tracy's first year ever running cross country - she was a swimmer before - and Amelia Allen's first as a varsity runner. Allen described her first year of running cross country as "full-time."

Tracy took 92nd place in Saturday's race in a time of 19:35.9, while Allen came in 141st in 20:21.1.

"It's really exciting for the two girls to come down," head coach Chandra Allen said. "It's been a while since two girls have come down, and they had a lot of fun and ran well."

The girls said they enjoyed the experience.

"I just wanted to see it was like," said Tracy.

Amelia Allen said it was actually "kinda fun."

"I didn't feel like I was dying the whole time," she said, adding that she was surprised by the amount of falling in the race. "There was lots of falling," she said with a laugh. "So I'm just glad I didn't fall."

The girls team as a whole has a lot to look forward to the next couple years. Next season, they will have three state-qualifying runners - Tracy, Allen, and junior Lauren Cawcutt, who is a three-time qualifier - and no graduating varsity runners. The team took third place at the 7AA Section meet this year; the top two teams advance to state, so they were close.

"It was exciting, and hopefully they can help lead the girls [to] make it [to state] as a team," coach Allen said.