Nick Lind makes state

By Brenda Erdahl

Maple Lake senior Nick Lind punched his ticket to the state cross country meet by finishing sixth last week at the Section 5A Championships in Hinckley-Finlayson.

The Irish cross country teams made the long trek north on Thursday, Oct. 26 for the qualifier where the top six individuals and top two teams would advance to state. It was just their second time running on the Hinckley-Finlayson course. The section finals were held in Pierz for years until the switch this season.

Lind said he really liked the Pierz course and wished it could have stayed there, but the change of venue didn’t seem to affect his performance. The now two-time state qualifier, finished the 5K in a time of 17:19.20 for sixth place.

Not only was the course new (the team ran on it one other time this year a Hinckley-Finlayson invitational) it was wet and muddy, which made the race all the more challenging for Irish athletes.

“It was drizzling and cool, but it had rained a lot before the race and the course had standing water on parts of it. It was muddy and a lot of people fell. It made the course not as fast as I would have liked,” Lind said. “I ended up in a good place position wise, but my time was mediocre.”

Lind went confidently into Thursday’s race, knowing his times had been competitive all season and he had been working hard. “I just needed to run a good race,” he said.

He set his sights on Cathedral’s Griffen Ward with the thought that if he could just stay with Ward for as long as he could, he would have a good time, he said. The plan worked. Lind crossed the finish line just nine seconds behind his rabbit to just meet the state qualifying threshold.

Maple Lake senior Nick Lind will compete at the University of Minnesota’s Les Bolstad Golf Course at noon on Saturday, Nov. 4 in the State Cross Country Meet.