Before her first cross country race of the season, Nicole Campbell confessed that a fast time was not in the plan. She merely wanted to turn in a strong effort and enjoy the experience with her West Valley Track Club teammates.
Nonetheless, when the starting gun was fired she took off with the lead group and never looked back and sprinted through the finish in fourth-place at last Saturday’s UC Santa Cruz XC Challenge.
Campbell, a 2000 Palisades High graduate from Topanga who captained the Dolphins’ cross country and track teams, completed the four-mile course in 24:19, two seconds behind the third-place finisher and 18 seconds off her personal-best time. Campbell’s splits were 6:30 for the first mile, 6:16 for the second and 11:31 for the last two miles.
A month earlier, in the final race of the extended spring track season, Campbell took sixth place in the Marin Miracle Mile with a time of 5:07. Her next race is the Rebels XC Challenge this Saturday in Sacramento.
Campbell qualified for City finals in the mile all four years at Pali High and went on to run at Humboldt State, where she graduated with a degree in Environmental Engineering.
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