With two very small, young teams consisting of only 9 upperclassmen for both the boys and girls, Coffee County’across country teams entered into a “rebuilding phase” during the  2017 season.  There was difficulty filling some of the spots the seniors from last year left. Many of the competitors were multi sport athletes making it difficult to compete at every meet. Despite this difficulty, the boys’ team usually placed in the top three at each event.  On the other hand, the girls’ team had the best season in the school’s history. Despite coming off an ankle sprain in the summer Sarah Pearson, along with Emily St. John and Byanka Woods, led an inexperienced younger team built up of almost entirely freshman to an almost perfect record. Both teams made a name for Coffee County, racing well in two large meets, one of these being an invitational. “I’m very pleased with our performances this year and the development of our athletes. We were able to compete in some special races this year. Getting to go to an invitational meet in Chattanooga was a fun experience. We had an incredibly difficult regional meet where the first mile and a half was entirely uphill. We overcame a lot of hurdles and that speaks a lot about the integrity of the team and its ability to persevere,” said Coach  Nathan Wanuch.

Many of the teams’ runners progressed at an extreme rate this season. One of these runners was  senior Neil Slone who went from being the seventh varsity runner in past years to the number two runner on the team. Christian Alvarez and Jacob Melton also had a very accelerated progression rate. Melton bumped a teammate out of his varsity spot toward the end of the year and claimed it for himself. For the girls, Emily St. John ran in the shadow of her teammate Sarah Pearson and eventually surpassed her at the last meet of the season. “Next season definitely won’t be the same without our seniors. We lose all of our captains on both sides. It will be different not coaching Slone. I’ve coached him every year I’ve been coaching. I’m looking at the younger athletes to fill these leaders’ shoes. We’ll be an even younger team next year but we will have a strong freshmen class coming in,” Wanuch concluded. Coach Wanuch, as well as the teams, look toward the 2018 season with confidence.