By Michael Newman

mike@dyestat.com

Warrenville, Ill --- You can call every race that Glenbard West’s Lindsey Payne runs routine. The sophomore from Glen Ellyn has dominated every invitational race that she has run this year running under 17 minutes in the process. She did it again on this cool October Saturday morning on the St. James Farm 2.95 mile course wiping out her competition once again going under 17 minutes. Her time of 16:43.8 was more than enough to win the championship flight of the Wheaton North Falcon Classic. Her margin of victory was an astounding 46 seconds ahead of second place Alana Austin (Naperville Central HS).

Payne’s strategy is pretty simple. She makes sure she is in position towards the front by the beginning of the second mile and then goes to work. In this race, she had no choice but to take the lead.

“My goal today was that I wanted to push it during the second mile,” Payne said after the race. “I just wanted to keep it up at that point. I tend to slow it down in the middle. I just wanted to work on having a consistent pace. I went out a little harder than expected. I did not want to get boxed in at the beginning (around the first turn).”

It was not a lark in the park or a tempo run for her. She was pushing the pace. The strain in her face was evidence of that. There was satisfaction in her voice after she finished. A strong northeasterly wind did not help either. However, it did not seem to bother her.

“The wind definitely bothered me when we came out of the forest,” she said. “When I was running on the right side of the berm, I felt it a lot. I had to keep my head down and push forward. I also felt it at the finish. Other than that, it felt good because the trees were blocking a lot of that.

You could call this race a training run for this Wednesday night’s Naperville Twilight Invitational for the Glenbard West runner. It is a race that she is definitely looking forwards to.

“We actually had a hard week of training. I was not expecting a PR or anything. I know they will be beneficial and pay off later,” Payne added. “I am very excited and very nervous for Wednesday. They (Judy Pendergast and Ashley Tutt) are great competitors. I respect them so much. I know they are going to push me. It will be cool to have someone that I can try to catch.”

Payne helped Glenbard West win the team championship with her win. The way that the Hilltoppers won this meet was not routine as they scored 16 points. It is usually the team with the most individual wins in the flight format that wins the championship. It was not the case for the 3A 2^nd ranked team in the state. Payne’s win was sole victory for the team. They did show their depth placing second in four of the seven flights. Glenbard received second place finishes from Kathryn Kenwood in Flight 2, Grace Rogers in Flight 3, Katie Hohe in Flight 6, and Claire Kenwood in Flight 7.

#11 New Trier displayed their depth early in the Flights finishing either first or second in the first five flights run. The final two flights were they scored fifteen points between the two was the difference giving them second place with 22 points. There was satisfaction in the New Trier camp after the race as they received wins by Caroline Fix in Flight 3, Caroline Truckenbrod in Box 6, and Rachel Weix in Flight 7. 2A #1 Yorkville finished third with wins by freshmen Olivia Borowiak in Flight 4 and Nicole Greyer in Flight 5.

The best flight race of the day was Flight 2 were there was no clear winner until the final stages of the race. Six runners were together with 800 meters to go. Madison Romig (Grant HS, Fox Lake) made a move just before the turn heading towards the finish line. Romig crossed the line in 17:42.7 three seconds ahead of Glenbard West’s Kathryn Kenwood.