The Western Albemarle pair of Steven Thompson and Ashley Early both came away from wins at the Lake Braddock Pole Vault Summit as both have placed themselves on the right track to win AA state titles in the pole vault this winter as Thompson is the defending champion on the boys side.

A battle was waged at the F.I.T. Relays between schools from Northern Virginia, Maryland, and the District of Colombia and as a result, some exciting track and field action was found at the Prince George County\'s Sports and Learning Complex. Though no team scores were kept, it was clearly obvious that the Westfield boys have the most talented track team in Northern Region and quite possibly in the entire state. Despite sitting out their distance studs David Groff and James Scheiner, the Bulldogs saw plenty of strong performances from their athletes in other events.

Many Richmond area athletes showed up at the Green Dragon Clinic Invitational held at the Arthur Ashe Center over the holidays to compete as some solid performances were found throughout the meet. Top meet performers included jumping event double winners Prince George's Allen Brown and Shoshana Pettes as well as St. Catherine's Ann Trip, who took two victories in the distance races.

The 2003 edition of the East Coast Invitational will be a competitive one with many of the top track athletes in the Richmond area as well as many other parts of state of Virginia will be doing battle at the Arthur Ashe Center for the two day event.

Capping off an amazing fall of cross country from the girls of Crozet on the Western Albemarle girls' cross country team, the Lady Warriors finished the season ranked 21st in the country in the final 2003 cross country edition of "The Harrier", the official national ranking magazine of high school cross country. The Western Albemarle girls won their second consecutive VHSL Group AA state team title this fall under second year head coach Carin Ward, a former Western Albemarle runner on past great Western Albemarle teams in the mid 90's.

The location has changed and the format has changed, but it looks like the Friends of Indoor Track (F.I.T.) Relays will once again provide some great quality competition as we usher out year 2003 and springboard towards the 2004 indoor and outdoor track and field seasons.

The Washington-Lee girls from Arlington ventured north to compete at the Bishop Loughlin Games held at the New York Armory and saw some admirable performances in the distance races.

The newly resurfaced Arthur Ashe Center track was debuted for invitational competition this past weekend at the Green Dragon Relays as numerous teams from the Richmond area and outside of the area came to compete in a relay dominated event.

To some of you, Wally Gilbert, is just the name of a track meet held each year at Heritage High School in Lynchburg, Virginia. However, I had the pleasure of getting up close and personal with the man, Wally Gilbert, and I can tell you he is much more than just a name.

Keira Carlstrom, a 2002 graduate of Oakton High School, and currently a sophomore at American University in Washington, D.C., was featured in a recent article on fast-women.com. Carlstrom is coming off an oustanding sophomore season of cross country where she earned NCAA All-American honors with a 16th place finish at the NCAA Division I National Cross Country Championships.

At the CNU Winter Frolic, many teams were getting their feet wet with the majority of the competitors competing in their first indoor meet of this young season. The Lake Braddock boys and girls' track teams both were impressive in taking both team titles.

Beth Fahey of Forest Park finished her strong senior cross country season with an admirable 27th place finish at the Foot Locker Nationals race at Balboa Park in San Diego with a time of 18:39. Fahey was the fifth finisher for the South region after being the final national qualifying individual at Foot Locker South with a eight place finish. Fahey was only one of three Virginia girls who have qualified for Foot Locker Nationals competition in the past five years (Erin Swain in 1999 and Cara Kiernan in 2002).

Both Bethel and Kecoughtan's girl track teams made the trek north to compete at the University of Maryland-Eastern Shore Invitational held at UMES's W. P. Hytche Athletic Center. Each team had individuals who faired well in early season competition.

The indoor track season got underway for many squads at the Walt Cormack Relays, held at VMI\'s indoor track facility, commonly known as \"The Pit\". No one athlete shook \"The Pit\" more on the day than the performance put forth by Spotswood\'s Nathan Turner in the shot put.

Plenty of close calls and tough choices sums up the final selections for this year\'s All-MileStat.com cross country team, which honors the top runners and coaches in the state for their great achievements this past fall.

Christopher Newport University\'s Brandon Miles and Cary Chaffee were honored by SouthRegionRunning.com as co-freshmen of the year for the NCAA Division III South/Southeast Region. Meanwhile, the CNU women\'s cross country team coaching staff of Keith Maurer, George Seward, and Cassie Stilley received honors as the region\'s top women\'s coaching staff for the season.

Virginia Tech director of track and field Dave Cianelli has announced the first members of his 2004 recruiting class with the signing of four student-athletes during the early signing period.

William & Mary head men

The Spiders inked 4 student-athletes during the early signing period. Caitlin Chock (Granite Bay High School-Granite Bay, CA) who defended her California Cross Country title on November 29th and is a 2002 Foot Locker National Finalist, Kate Merrill (Jordan High School-Durham, NC) who defended her state championship title in North Carolina this fall and is also a 2002 Foot Locker National Finalist, Johanna McKnight (John Curtis High School, LA) the 2003 Louisiana State 200M Champion and Patricia Graves (Jamestown High School-Jamestown, NY) who is a shot put and discus specialist.

Starting this winter, Geoff Moore will be compiling weekly team track team rankings based off top 8 deep lists in all the events for Group AAA. He will also be breaking down AAA into the respective regions (Central, Eastern, Northern, Northwest).