Freedom sophomore Lauren Charboneau was the winner of the Patriot girls’ first cross country scrimmage last Thursday at Freedom.

The Patriots hosted the scrimmage which included Liberty, Whitehall, and Southern Lehigh.

Charboneau’s time was 20:08.

“I was hoping for a P.R., but I died on the back stretch after the two mile,” she said.

Also, the grass had grown too high at Freedom by Thursday evening, making it difficult for anyone to P.R.

Liberty’s Greta Stuckey placed second in 21:09, Southern Lehigh’s J. Grober placed third in 21:20, Liberty’s Emily Jobes was fourth in 21:22, Southern Lehigh’s C. Shell came in fifth in 21:35, Southern Lehigh’s N. Morgan placed sixth in 21:40, and Liberty’s Belle Weikert came in seventh in 22:03. First names for Southern Lehigh were unavailable at press time.

Whitehall’s Autumn Dragovits placed eighth in 22:14, Liberty’s Grace Haas was ninth in 22:28, Liberty’s Madison Drager came in 10th in 23:03, and Whitehall’s Devon Roberts placed 11th in 23:08.

“Lauren had a good first race. I know she’s in pretty good shape,” said Freedom coach Bob Thear. “This was kind of a low-key way to break into the season, and for new people, it’s a good way to break them in as well.”

Charboneau attended two running camps this summer: one at Lehigh University and one at Duke University.

“Duke helped me adjust to the weather here. A normal day there is 90 degrees,” Charboneau said. “I really didn’t have to fix my form, but they helped me with a lot of tips and stuff.”

Thursday night’s weather was on the side of the runners and the fans.

“For how the weather’s been most of the summer, we caught a break here,” said Thear. “I ran it a little bit later for that reason, but we could have run it at noon time today.”

On the boys side, Whitehall’s Caleb Staub was 14th in 19:35.

The boys race was won by Southern Lehigh’s Alec DiCesare who edged Liberty’s Darlyn Fermin.