Keira Whitehead

One of the top female runners in school history, Abby Yourkavitch, is now wearing the jersey of East Carolina University. In her four years at Chambersburg, she was a dominating No. 1 runner for the cross country team and was the District 3 champion last year.

Without her this fall, the Trojans will use a different strategy and still hope to add to their streak of qualifying as a team for the PIAA Championships, a run that currently stands at seven years in a row.

“It’s a different kind of team, because we’re used to having a strong No. 1,” Chambersburg coach Chris Monheim said. “But that also meant we had a giant gap between the No. 1 and the rest. On this year’s team, our top five could be within a minute of each other, and I think we still have the potential to real strong.”

The Trojans have a squad of 21, a lower number than usual, and it includes only three seniors and three juniors.

Anna DeGrange

Monheim said, “It’s probably the youngest team I’ve ever had. We might have one senior on varsity by the season’s end, and most of the varsity will be sophomores and freshmen.”

In the preseason workouts, three returning runners have done well — junior Anna DeGrange and sophomores Keira Whitehead and Maddie Kinton. Whitehead placed 16th in District 3 last year, Kinton was 69th and DeGrange was 81st.

“It’s a nice top three, but I wouldn’t know what order to rank them in,” Monheim said.

Also making a bid to run with the varsity (top seven) are junior Camaryn Ellis, senior Tara Hathaway and freshmen Allison List, Olivia Rieck, Emilea Alleman and Amelya Mauriello.

Maddie Kinton

Monheim said, “We had a really good summer working with a smaller crew — we had 10 to 15 girls at every practice. They’ve worked hard, but we need to get into a competitive environment.”

That will happen Friday, when Chambersburg hosts the annual Enos Yeager Invitational at its Tim Cook Course at 5:30 p.m.

“On paper, we might not look that strong, but we might have enough to contend for that No. 4 spot at districts and get to states,” Monheim said.