Freshman Maya Crimin has been running competitively since the second grade. “I just love running, it’s always been something I like to do,” she said. Crimin finds that her strength is in longer distances rather than shorter distances. Crimin decided to participate in La Salle’s cross country team because she has been running competitively for so long. 

Cross country isn’t the only sport Crimin participates in, she plans on being a part of the La Salle swim team as well as the track and field team, although she previously quit because she “didn’t like it.” 

The balance between these activities hasn’t been hard for Crimin because, “cross country [is] my number one [sport],” she said. 

Being a part of the team’s atmosphere has been a very enjoyable experience for Crimin. “I like the practices more because then I get to run with people and I don’t really like running alone. It just makes me sad,” she said. 

The cross country team does a lot of team bonding activities like escape rooms, weekly team dinners, and visiting haunted corn mazes, which Crimin didn’t attend because, “I don’t like scary things,” she said. 

Before running for La Salle, Crimin ran for Bowerman track club, where she ran from her sixth grade year all the way to her eighth grade year. The Bowerman track club was “a really good experience,” she said. “It was way more competitive and hardcore than my other team,” she said.

As for the running season, Crimin’s current personal record for the 5K is 19:51.21 minutes, which she achieved in a race called The Harrier Classic. This time is about 50 seconds off from the current school record of 19:01.6. set in 2018 by a La Salle graduate, who at the time was a senior. 

Crimin said the possibility of beating the record “would be amazing, but I’m not going to be fighting for it each race and [be] let down and disappointed if I can’t drop my time enough to beat it,” she said. 

While beating the record would be a great accomplishment, it’s not the main goal for Crimin right now. Some goals for this season include qualifying for state, which she has accomplished, and keeping her spot in districts, while passing a few more people. She would also like to run a sub 20 again, which is a 5K time under 20 minutes. 

As for the future, Crimin thinks “it might be cool to run in college,” she said. But, she still isn’t sure as she has an aunt that ran in college and “ by the end she didn’t like it anymore,” she said. 

Last weekend Crimin ran in the OSAA 5A State Championships. She came in first for the La Salle girls cross country team and placed 23rd out of 91 overall, finishing with a time of 20:52.50.