Lester '18 an All-American in Cross Country

Page Lester '18 earned All-American honors in her final cross country race as an NCS student, finishing 14th at the Foot Locker National Finals on Dec. 9 in San Diego.

 

Lester became the first girl from Washington, D.C., to qualify for nationals in back-to-back years, and she improved on her 2016 time by an amazing 14 seconds, finishing in a 5-kilometer time of 18:06.8.

 

The result completed a remarkable cross country career at NCS, in which Lester won 12 of 18 local races, including three Independent School League titles and two D.C. State Athletic Association titles, and took second place in four others. She also twice placed fifth in the Foot Locker Northeast Regional. This week, the Washington Post named Lester its Cross Country Athlete of the Year.

 

The national result was 18 spots better than her 2016 result, and Lester said it ranks among her most satisfying races ever. "I have pretty high expectations for myself, and I usually don't meet what I think I can do. But this time I surprised myself," she said. (Her most memorable result? When the NCS team won its first ISL title in five years this November. "That's probably my best moment of high school, in general," she said.)

 

A back injury had limited Lester's training since the regional race, and her ability to run nationals was in doubt through much of the week. Once the starting gun sounded, though, "the adrenaline really kicked in," she said.

 

"I just wanted to finish, because I didn't know how I'd respond" to the injury, she said. "But once I was in the race and I realized I was in the top 20, I thought I might as well go for" the top 15, a result that carries All-American status.

 

Lester got there thanks to a charging final mile, with one of the 10 fastest times up the steep Upas Street hill. "That hill is pretty hard," she admitted. "I didn't know what place I had, but I knew I was right on the border of All-American."

 

Congratulations to Page for this amazing accomplishment!