The 4A cross country season will be wild. Although you could make an argument for 6A or 1A-D1, I would contend that 4A received the highest competitive boost from the new GHSA realignment. We'll get into the specifics later in the article, but private schools such as Westminster (from 3A), Pace Academy (2A), Lovett (2A) and Holy Innocents' (1A Private) will all square off in 4A for the next few seasons. These teams will be joined by other strong public schools such as North Hall (3A), Cherokee Bluff (3A), Starr's Mill (5A), and Whitewater (5A). On the other hand, a few of last year's 4A schools including Marist, Jefferson, and Flowery Branch move up in the new classification system, while Columbus and Pickens County move down. I'm already excited to see how this season shakes out in November.
Boys Team
How interesting is the boys' 4A state race this year? Well, for starters, there are THREE defending champions that will have to compete against each other, including last year's state champs in 4A (Chestatee), 3A (Westminster), and 2A (Pace). On top of that, there are an additional two state runners-up joining the party: Lovett (2A) and Holy Innocents' (1A Private). After reading that, would you believe me if I said none of those teams are the on-paper favorites heading into this season? Starr's Mill actually has the best crop of returners, as they bring back 5 of their top 6 from last season's 4th place finish in 5A. While they don't have a superstar front runner, they boast an entire top 5 that has 4:40/10:10-type speed or better. Bankson Roach ran a 16:46 as a freshman last year, and Ethan Aguilera-Morton and Nat Miller are two seniors who ran sub-17 last year. Their top two returners from last year's state meet are Denver Oates and Grant Dougher. This is a rare team who may be able to stuff their whole top 5 within a 30-second window in November.
The Panthers' top rival this fall is likely Westminster, who will be gunning for their sixth straight team title. Matthew Fernando has graduated, but the Wildcats still return a very solid top two with Joseph Jacquot and Esfan Daya, both of whom have sub-16:20 PRs and top-4 finishes in the 3200m at state to their names. For Westminster to keep their streak alive, they will likely need at least one more runner to hang with Starr's Mill's pack. Sam Maas and Willem Mandel both had great track campaigns, and Tyler Robinson didn't run track but is the 12th fastest returner from last year's 3A state meet.
Chestatee has been incredible the past two seasons, taking down the favored Marist boys twice in a row. Now that the Grater twins are gone, the War Eagles' hopes lie with a fearsome trio of Aaron Retana, Javier Rebollar, and Noah Peters. Behind those three, Chestatee will need to find some runners to step up if they hope to shock everyone a third time. Lovett and Pace both suffered heavy losses due to graduation, but these programs should never be counted out. Holy Innocents' moves up to 4A just as they put together one of their best teams in program history, and they will be mixing it up with Westminster and Chestatee as well. Finally, Cedartown was the hard-luck team in a very tough Region 7-4A, missing out on the state meet, but they return their whole top 7 from that region meet, led by sub-10:00 3200m runner Dalton Benefield.
Boys Individual
The 4A boys' individual race will also be one to tune into. Joe Sapone of Holy Innocents' put together a 1:52/4:11 campaign this track season and has the fastest 5k PR of any returning boy in the state. His new rival will be Alex Arrambide, who barely missed out on the distance triple crown at the 3A state track meet and is a 1:53/4:11/9:08 runner himself. I really hope those two are side by side heading up the final hill at Carrollton in November. Retana and Rebollar of Chestatee, Daya and Jacquot of Westminster, and Matthew Wells of Pace will be trying to hang with those two guys. Gabriel Best of Whitewater will try to make his last name into a true statement after a strong track season saw him dip under 9:45 in the 3200.