The Long View: The Rise of Tandem XC

Emma Johnson
You may not think of Tandem, our alma mater, as an athletic powerhouse. Yet for a school of our size, we’ve had some incredible triumphs in sports. Back in the early 2010s, girls soccer was the dominant program at Tandem. They were on a 3-year state championship winning streak. Yet, with a small pool of students there’s always an ebb and flow, a rise and fall. When one program is big and popular, it draws students away from others. The dominant program today, whether you believe it or not, is cross country.

 
This all started with history teacher, Jason Farr, and former head of school, Andy Jones-Wilkins. 
Jason and Andy were both competitive ultrarunners and they started going on runs together. Andy remembers, “We would spend time just kind of running and talking about stuff.” One of the things they talked about was a vision for what cross country could be at Tandem.

Jason remembers, “We both agreed that, of all the sports, cross country was a perfect Tandem sport.” He says, “At most schools the cross country kids are kind of quirky and good students and that’s like most Tandem kids: quirky, good students, and willing to work hard.”

Running also embodies the Quaker tenet of Simplicity. Andy believed that the program could work and grow without a lot of tending. The thought was, Andy says, “to develop an anchor program with a sport where it didn’t matter if you had a lot of kids or a few kids. You didn’t need a lot of equipment. You didn’t need a fancy facility. You didn’t need a whole lot of skills. You didn’t need to have grown up coming through a pipeline of youth soccer or basketball or anything else.”

On a hot summer day in 2013, Andy called Jason to his office in the Main Building. He wanted to ask Jason if he’d like to be the new cross country coach after Joe Doherty, (MS Math/Science teacher), the current coach, was leaving.

Jason says, remembering that day in Andy’s office, “I was very brazen and confident and I said ‘Give me ten years, I can win a state championship.’ Andy kind of laughed at that and said, ‘I LOVE IT!’”

Maybe it was the heat or Andy’s exuberance, but Jason had some experience to back him up. Though he grew up in Tennessee playing football and didn’t get into running until college, Jason later worked under a great high school cross country coach in Asheville, North Carolina, Steve Carpenter. Jason says, “I learned a lot when I was in Asheville. That was one reason I had so much confidence.” Steve shared with Jason, but he also knew what an opportunity it was so Jason says he “watched and observed and absorbed everything I could.” 
What Jason saw is that Steve’s system worked. “He took kids through a lot of psychological work, and just got a lot out of them.” In Asheville, Jason learned that developing a great team is less about perfecting strategy and more about building a culture. He calls this “one of the secrets of coaching running.” That really it all comes down to, as Jason says, “getting kids to believe that they can do hard things.”

Ultimately, getting kids to believe they can do hard things isn’t about physical training or even sports necessarily. It’s mental. In truth, so much of running is. Jason admits “Not every coach can do that and I don’t do it with every kid, but I think we’ve built a culture where now the kids help each other.”

How did they get there? How do you build a culture?

Part 1: The Early Days

In the early days of Jason’s tenure as cross country coach, the focus was on getting kids to join the team and making running fun. Tandem XC was full of fun. For as much as running can be mentally and physically grueling, the team made up for it with ample amounts of silliness.

Noah Tinsley ’18 shares, “I think the team had a really cool vibe. It’s a cool sport because it really combines team effort and individuals trying to do their thing.” Noah also remembers one race, “There was this puddle and I remember going and laying in the puddle” after the race. “Felt really good,” he says.

I began running cross country with Andy when I was in 6th grade. In 8th grade, I joined the Varsity squad and being a part of this team had a huge impact on my Tandem experience. There was no shame in cross country. We talked about it all, all the gross, nasty, weird parts of pushing your body to the limits of what it could do.
Another muddy memory comes from Pearl Outlaw ’15: “I went on a summer run and it ended up being super rainy and muddy and basically we just embraced it. We were running in the rain, and we were covered in mud, and we jumped in the lake over at the development. We took this photo when we got back and we’re just all smiling, covered in mud.”

Tandem XC May, 2014

I think this image captures what cross country was in those days. Not pretty or perfect, but fun, everyone embracing the messiness and getting down in the mud.

Pearl remembers the toughness, grit, and wildness of the team in the first few years with Jason coaching. Alec Simon ‘16 “forgot his shoes one day and we were running hill sprints, and so he ran hill sprints in bare feet. His feet were black and blue and grass stained. We would do anything for Jason. We were like ‘Okay, Jason, whatever you say!’”

Perhaps it sounds a bit cultish, buying into the extreme, and willing to do anything for your “guru.” But it was also a safe and warm place, where everyone’s individual goals were just as important as any collective mission.

Pearl Outlaw is one of the great Tandem XC legends. She represents what the team was, and is, at its core, as well as how being a part of something special can change your life.

Growing up, Pearl says that sports “didn’t feel super comfortable for me. They were very intimidating.” But she knew she wanted to continue participating in athletics and “cross country just seemed the most welcoming and comfortable.”

Pearl remembers, “I didn’t see myself as a runner at all before that.” Being a part of the cross country team was different than any other sport she had tried. “I remember immediately feeling so comfortable and just not judged.”

This is the consistent message I heard, and what I remember from being a part of the team myself. In many ways it’s part of what makes Tandem special, its unique, good energy. But that special Tandem feeling became concentrated, for many, on the cross country team.

Pearl says, “While I was running, my vision was changing, too. Now, I’m nearly completely blind, but back then I could still run, and I would pretty much just follow whoever was in front of me.” She remembers one race her senior year, the meet before states, where the course was mostly through open grass fields. As it was getting dark “I started to realize like ‘oh, my gosh I can’t see where I’m going.’ And I don’t know what people around me were thinking because I kept saying that to the spectators, and I think they were just confused. But no one was doing anything. I was like ‘I can’t see!’ Literally I can’t see the trail.’”

A little further along the course she found Jason and the boys’ team, on a cool down run after their race and then she found Emma Passino ‘17. Emma and Pearl grabbed each other and they “held hands basically for the rest of the race and ran together because I had lost my way,” Pearl says with a sarcastic chuckle.

If you asked Jason, he would say this is what Tandem XC is all about. Not a state title, but moments like these, when people come together to support one another. At the end of every season, Jason holds a party to celebrate and acknowledge that year’s group of runners. It’s an important part of the culture, celebrating milestones, accomplishments, and setting goals for the future.

Before we ever won any titles, he created awards to honor the values of the team: courage, tenacity, kindness. He named an award after Pearl, called the ‘Pearl Outlaw Courage Award.’ It’s a high honor in the name of an incredible and inspiring athlete.

Pearl Outlaw, September 2014

For Pearl, who now competes as a professional rower, Jason’s ability to recognize and lift up every runner is an essential component of a great team. She says, “any team that I’ve been on, the best ones are where no matter if you’re the fastest on the team or the back of the pack, you still feel like the coach believes in you and is invested in you. I think Jason was really able to do that,” says Pearl. “You just felt like he cared about every single person on the team and how they did, no matter where they were in their running.”

Even though Pearl has reached incredible heights in her athletic career, rowing for the United States in three world championships, she’s still finding new ways to challenge herself. This year she switched from flatwater rowing, in rivers and streams, to coastal rowing, off beaches and in the ocean. Pearl says, “I just did my first world championship with them in September and we were the first para-team basically in the sport that had competed at world championships.”

Her running days came back in use in coastal rowing. One of the events involves sprinting down the beach into the water and jumping into the boat. One day, Pearl says “we were practicing that, and I did my first sprint into the water, and I think I face planted in a wave or something, but from that moment on I was like ‘this is awesome! This is amazing!’”

It’s that attitude, getting knocked down by a wave and thinking ‘I can’t wait to do that again,’ that Jason hopes to cultivate as an essential, courageous, and joyful part of the cross country team.
Reminiscing about the old days running cross country, Pearl is smiling. She remembers “I think it was cross country first” where “I started seeing myself as an athlete...and feeling like even with my eyesight I could really do anything.”

The one bad memory, Pearl says, is of the cross country page of the yearbook from her senior year which only had photos of the boys running; none of the girls were represented. I went back and looked. The title reads “Varsity Cross Country” and we see Jason and the boys, but none of the girls on the team.
 
TFS Yearbook 2016
This oversight marks an issue that the cross country team has faced for some time and is still working through. It’s been one of the only co-ed sports at Tandem, and boys and girls practicing together has been one of the things that makes the team unique and special. But often the focus and the spotlight has been on the boys. This is something Jason is aware of and has been trying to remedy, shifting his focus in recent years to the development of the girls team.

I remember at the end-of-season party in my senior year, Jason handed out bricks that were painted green with silver writing that read “TANDEM XC.” He gave a brick to each of the girls and told us that we were the foundation. This literally heavy-handed metaphor made me laugh, but I also felt hopeful that we would grow. I still have my brick. Since then, the girls team has faced hurdles, growing and then falling in numbers again during the pandemic. Now, it’s on the rise with a strong group of runners, many of them sophomores and freshman, poised to flourish.

Jason says, “We had six girls on the team last year and 18 boys, and that’s my big goal now; I want to build the girl’s program to the same level.”

The cross country team faces a unique challenge as it seeks to hold both teams under one umbrella of coaches and resources. Still, Jason’s distinct style and approach help him to connect to all kinds of runners.
A characteristic of Jason’s coaching style is the use of mantras to develop mental confidence. He drills the team with these repetitive phrases and metaphors. They’re often funny, but Jason explains that “running is 90 percent mental and the other 10 percent is in your head.”

The value in these mantras he says, “is that there comes a point in every race or hard workout where you’re full of doubt. Doubt will creep in because you’re pushing your body to its maximum…you’re asking your body to do something right on the edge of what’s possible.”

Oftentimes cramps, that pinch in the side, are neuromuscular. “Mantras are just ways to trick that neuromuscular pathway, by making the “pain cave” a happy place that you want to visit. It normalizes the suffering.” But pain is a tricky thing. It’s important to attend to, not hide from, because ignoring pain can lead to injury.

The “pain-cave” is one of Jason’s most famous mantras. I remember him drawing it on the white board in the Field House. You journey into and through this painful place, but there is another side, something to be found by making it through. Noah Tinsley remembers, “I think Jason kind of portrayed it in a funny context, like ‘oh yeah they’re in the pain cave,’ but everyone knows it’s a very real thing. It wasn’t a thing to be avoided. It’s just gonna happen.”

In the early days, the team made t-shirts that said “It’s Supposed to Hurt.” But Jason avoids some of that rhetoric now. “In the beginning,” he says, “it was a matter of distinguishing between jogging and racing. To actually race, it’s going to be painful, and you have to know that and prepare for it.”
Here’s Noah again: “You can extrapolate that in a life way. You’re going to end up in other pain caves and that’s not a bad thing if you’re in the pain cave. It’s just good to say ‘I know that I’m here, and I know there’s something waiting for me if I go through this properly.’ I feel like the worst pain cave is if you just kind of avoid the pain.”

The truth is, despite their strangeness, the mantras seem to work, and they become a part of the fabric and the language of the team. A key lesson from cross country for Noah, he says, was “the idea of separating your mind and your body, and being able to trust your body beyond what your mind thinks of it.”

Part 2: The Numbers Game

To put it plainly, Jason says, “To win in cross country, you need five.” For years the team was so close, with three or four runners at top speed. “But we never had five,” Jason says. Andy remembers, “competing at Woodberry Forest and Veritas was there, and Jason turned to me and said, ‘How are we ever going to beat these guys?’”

Ultimately, cross country is a numbers game. A legend in the cross country world, coach Joe Newton is famous for saying “there are state champions walking the halls of your school that you don’t even know about.”

Jason shares this quote and says, “Newton’s whole thing was to get as many kids on the cross country team as you could because you never know what lanky, goofy kid could actually become a champion runner…To be a competitive, very high-level high school cross country runner, almost any kid can do it if they’re willing to do the work. You’ve got to get them in, and make it fun, and then start pushing them.”

This is the recipe; get as many kids as you can, make it joyful, get them committed to doing the work, and then challenge them. It seems simple, but what it requires most of all is—another of Jason’s mantras—patience and consistency.

This has been the core of Jason’s philosophy leading the cross country program at Tandem.
His daughter, Sophie Farr, now in her senior year at Vassar College and captain of the cross country team, says that this slow and steady style gave her the stamina to keep growing as a runner. She attributes these important values to her dad. “While I may be biased, I think the coaching ethos at Tandem is unlike much else. It takes a special skill to cultivate an environment where no matter your skill level you are treated as an equal and are encouraged to work hard and have goals but also have fun and make incredible memories.” 
One of Sophie’s teammates at Vassar, Max Frazee ’22, is a fellow graduate of the Tandem XC program. Sophie says, “Because of Tandem I have a lifelong joy for running.”

Going slow is not a major value in our culture today, but it is something that Quakerism teachers us. Andy points out that Tandem XC “is a good example of how, especially in Quakerism, sometimes things take a long time.”

For many years the team made it close to their goal of a state championship. Jason, remembering the year that Noah Tinsley got the flu, says “We could’ve competed for state that year. He was one of our best runners. And you know, he gets the flu right before the state meet. Luka gets a stress fracture right before the state meet…We were so close for so many years and it was super frustrating. Mason’s senior year, we would’ve been state champions potentially. He would’ve been the individual state champion. COVID happened. So, it’s been so frustrating all those years that we were so close to not being able to finish it.”

When Mason Love ‘21 arrived on the scene, things began to shift. Jason says, “Mason was the linchpin.” In the 2018-2019 season Tandem won the state championship in the 4x800 relay with Mason, Luka Van der Pluijm '19, Nathan Stevenson ‘20, and Charlie Kennedy ‘19. Jason remembers, “that was the moment when everybody was like, wow, Tandem has arrived.” But that title was in track. The team had still yet to win in cross country.
 
Mason Love '21, Nathan Stevenson '20, Luka Van der Pluijm '19, Charlie Kennedy '19, and Jason Farr

For the finish to finally arrive in Fall 2023, ten years after Jason made his bold promise to Andy, came as necessary validation. Jason admits that “Honestly, I’m kind of shocked that we actually did pull off the 10-year state championship.” But it became clear to him that “what we were doing was the right thing. All those years. It was like we were doing it the right way.”

While a state championship is a great goal, it seems like what this program is truly after is supporting kids to reach their goals and giving them tools to navigate life.

Mason, the only male athlete in Tandem history to compete at the Division 1 level, puts it like this: “I would argue that while Jason did try to make us excellent runners his more major focus was creating lifelong runners and athletes, and at that...I think he succeeds to this day.”

I asked Jason to reflect on last year’s season that culminated in the long-awaited state championship. He shared that “one of my favorite memories from the past season–I mean, winning state was super cool–but Avery, 10th grade girl who works so hard and loves running, loves being on the team and is 100% committed. Her whole goal was to qualify for the GPAC championship. She just kept coming so close, and there was one more chance, one more meet, and the other girls had qualified. They all ran together. They all ran with Avery and pushed her and she qualified by like 30 seconds. I mean the joy on her face and just the fact that the team rallied behind her. That’s what Tandem Cross Country is all about. That sort of teamwork and togetherness and creating your own personal goal, and then everybody jumping in to help you reach it.”

Part 3: Champions

So this fall, the team had big goals. The boys were hoping to claim another win at states. Meanwhile, the girls were gunning for their first GPAC conference win.

Leading the boys this year is Hayes Buppert, a sophomore. “Hayes is a pretty cool story,” Jason says. Hayes is really fast and seems to only keep rising. Jason explains that “He’s a kid who just bought in, but I don’t know how to say this. He’s very humble about it. I mean, he’s just a kid. I think so many kids at his level get really caught up in the competitive part of it. Hayes is the type of kid who wants us to all get pancakes after a run.”
When I talked to Hayes, he told me that he first became serious about running as an 8th grader when he began practicing with the varsity team. “All the varsity boys runners were faster than me,” but he says “they were close enough to me. They were in my line of sight, so they were a goal and they were also motivation.”
Last year, as a freshman, Hayes kicked it up a gear. Jason says, “Really it was over the winter. He had a really good cross country season and he came to Ned and me and was like ‘I want to be really good at this. What do I need to do?’ And we just said ‘just do what we tell ya.’” They gave Hayes the winter training, the same winter training they gave to the whole team.

The difference, Jason says, was that “he did it. Every single day. Checked in with us every week. The result was his spring track season. He started off the year running 4:55 in the mile and by the end of the season was running 4:30 and qualified for the freshman championship race at New Balance Nationals. That’s huge progress.”

Jason remembers, “I used to have to really twist kids’ arms to get them to run in the summer.” But now, “they’re all running and they hold each other accountable. They organize stuff on their own. Running is part of who they are. And so that’s the culture they’ve created for themselves. The fact that Hayes is a sophomore, the 7th and 8th graders see that. And that’s how you continue the program.”

Hayes captures the crucial balancing act of cross country between the individual and the team. Cross country inspires an individualism not unlike the independent spirit that many students cultivate at Tandem. Yet, the sport also requires a balancing between the one and the many, the individual and the whole community. Here’s Andy again, “There’s always been an interesting dichotomy in Quakerism where we value that of the divine in every person, so everybody is valued as an individual and sometimes that requires us to take big risks and reaches in terms of how we treat each other individually. But we also have to build a community around it.” 

I asked Hayes what his goals are this for this season. “I want to win the state championship again this year. For me that’s going to be more about working with other people. I mean, I’m gonna keep working hard, but when you’re finishing in the front of a race, a few points don’t matter a lot, but what’s going to be more important is the 4 and 5 runners who could potentially be the difference between 10 points each which is going to be way more important. Now, I’ve got goals. I’m going to go and try to win the state championship. I don’t know that I can. We’ll see. I have my own goals for sure. But for our team I want to win states again, which I think we can, I think recently especially our 4-7 have really started giving it their all. Then” he says, “I want to see the girls win a GPAC championship.”
 
Hayes and Jason at the New Balance Nationals at Franklin Field, June 2024


Hayes knows what a difference it makes to be led by your teammates. “I mean I’m not gonna slow my workouts down, but some days that doesn’t matter at all and it’s totally fine to just go run with them. Cause that’s what helped me a lot in 8th grade and that’s what I’m trying to remember. I would go with those seniors and as an 8th grader that felt really cool, and that really helped, because they were all faster than me but on the days when it’s easy it doesn’t matter.”

Even in a sport as individual and mental as cross country, athletes work together and rely on their teammates to push and support them as they compete side by side.

The culture of Tandem XC continues to grow and evolve. Now, students are the primary recruiters. At the final Meeting for Worship last year, a senior, Henry Coulson ‘24, stood up and encouraged people to join cross country, as others have done in previous years. This has become a bit of a tradition. Jason says “Whitney’s even made jokes about it like, ‘You gotta tell them to stop doing that. Your teams are getting too big!’”
“I’m moved by it,” Jason continues and “I just get butterflies, and it’s not about me but it’s just, wow…That’s their thing, that’s what they’re really going to miss and that’s what they’re remembering in that really emotional moment.”

This essence of teamwork and support is the precious not-so-secret sauce that Jason never wants the team to lose. He says he’s always checking in with himself, “am I giving too much attention to the fast kids, am I neglecting the newer kids? Because those newer kids, especially the 8th graders, they’re gonna be that. That’s where Coach Ned (Fisher) has helped elevate, because the way our coaching dynamic works now is I let Ned run, literally run, with the fast kids–I can’t even keep up with them. Ned runs with them and then I coach the younger kids and the girls and they get huge amounts of my attention. It keeps building on itself.”

Part 4: A Meet at Home

It’s a beautiful day for cross country and this race is like few others: Tandem’s first home cross country meet. It’s been a dream of Jason’s for years, to be able to host something on campus. There are only two schools competing, Tandem and St. Anne’s Belfield. The course comprises five loops around the athletic fields, up the hill to the Field House and back down again, swerving through bird houses. It’s not an ideal course. It’s hard to keep track of the number of laps, both when you’re racing and exhausted, and for those managing the meet, trying to track who has another lap to go and who to direct toward the finish line. Still the energy feels jubilant and positive. The boys have their spikes on and shiny sunglasses so you can’t see their eyes.
Hayes runs his race smart, sticking with the front runner, pacing all the way. At the final downhill of the last lap he kicks ahead. I look to Jason’s face and see fierce joy. “Yes!” he cries as he pumps his fist.


The girls’ team has their faces painted green. They look like warriors. Before their race starts, they gather together in a huddle. I hear Lucy say, “let’s have a moment of silence.” They all go quiet. I think to myself, this is not old-school cross country, this is something new. 

Jason says he “encourages the runners to use this Quaker practice in their pre-race huddles to quiet their minds, settle into the moment, and look each other in the eyes and remember they are competing for each other. A lot of teams hoot and holler; we get silent and turn inward.”

Lucy, a sophomore and the current fastest runner on the girls team, tells me that she “started running in 5th grade, because I was very hyperactive and had to get a little control. I immediately loved running and haven’t ever taken a break. All the seasons.” I can feel her energy and enthusiasm for the sport. After I turn my recorder off, she asks me—clearly it’s been on her mind—“what was your PR?”

She describes the team culture as tight-knit despite its size. “This is the biggest team we’ve had in so long. It’s ridiculous. Last year we had an influx of new people and then the guys won the state championship which drew even more attention.”

I hear her navigating the same language I’ve been struggling with; “the team” means everyone of all genders, but then there’s also “the girls” and “the boys.” The team that scores is the gendered subdivision, and really it’s only the top five who score unless there’s a tie, but “the team” is a lot bigger than that. She describes the girls as “Really close. We talk about ridiculous things on our runs.” I remember this, the delirious things you talk about on long runs. Once you’re in shape, and running doesn’t feel like dying anymore, it’s a blast to be a part of a pack.

It’s clear that the team today is less co-ed than it once was, as numbers have grown and the boys have become more competitive they have also become more separate. The tricky thing, as beautiful as it is to have everyone practicing together, riding the bus together, stretching and lifting together, is that ultimately athletics are still deeply gendered. I’m reaching for a language that’s less binary than boys and girls, but it feels hard to escape when it’s the language of high school sports. 

Jason reveals that “The thing I’ve always worried about,” he pauses, “and I love that we’re a coed team,” but he wonders “if having two completely separate teams would help the girls be more successful.” 

I remember the annoying and frustrating things about running with boys. As we got older, I couldn’t beat them in foot races anymore. I remember the dirty jokes, the smelliness and endless silliness. But I also remember amazing things. The special feeling of cheering each other on, being in it all together. And after all the racing days are over, when it’s just about the beauty and love of running, it doesn’t matter.

I ask Lucy about her experience being coached by Jason and Ned. She says, “Okay, I love Jason so much. He’s so supportive. I don’t think that’s ever changed, he’s always been there to make running what you want it to be.” Lucy also likes the way that Ned and Jason partner together as coaches. “I don’t know how to describe it. It’s like Jason is the old soul but Ned ran in college, and so he knows that side of competitive running, whereas Jason is there to make it fun, Ned is there like, ‘Do you want to be fast?’ Which is a nice balance because then they both switch sometimes.”

I also ask her to share her individual and team goals for this year. “Okay, you can’t laugh at me. I’m at a 22:59 right now at the Panorama course and I want to be at 21:30, which is the school female record for a 5k. And I really want to beat that this year–per Jason. I’ve been training at 21 flat 5ks in workouts, but I’ve not been able to really get there yet. So I’m hoping that will happen.”

For the team, the goal is to win the conference. Lucy says “that’s either a this year thing or a next year thing, we’ll get it.” I love her sureness and confidence. I believe her. She sounds like Jason in Andy’s office, maybe a little crazed, but I wouldn’t bet against her.

Part 5: The Last Race

Pulling up the long drive to Panorama Farms, I’m reminded of all the times I’ve run here. Even though today I’m only here to watch, I feel a nervousness creep into my stomach. I want the team to do well. I want everyone to have a good race. The reality is some of the runners out there will have great races and others may feel defeated.

Hayes sets the stage for states: “It’s really two other teams-it’s Veritas School and Eastern Mennonite and everyone on their teams has steadily improved. Veritas is the one that, they’ve just gotten steadily better faster than we have.”

Teams are running by warming up and there’s a sea of tents, one for each school. I search for the Tandem tent. I remember when we didn’t have a tent. I finally find it, big and grey–these are the XC colors, grey and green. I see the boys’ team run by, Hayes leading the pack. They look focused, strong. Jason says he’s nervous. I can feel the anxiety hovering around the tent. Everyone is itching, ready to go, unsure of what’s to come. Ten minutes before the start time, the boys head over to the starting line to find their block. They run strides up and down the field. They jump up, shake their muscles, trying to stay warm.

The Veritas team looks strong, too. Their uniforms are these spandex sleeveless suits that run down to their knees. They look sort of like super heroes. As the teams stride, the sound of stomping feet echoes. It sounds like a horse track. Then the Tandem boys gather at the box and they do something none of the other teams do, they sit down. They’re resting. They’re patient. 

As the gun goes off, a Gator with a ticking clock leads the front runners and they’re out fast. Hayes is right there with another runner, Curtis Leechman from Wakefield, for the whole race. Not only is Hayes fast, but watching him compete, you can see his intelligence, his strategy. He knows how to wait and pick his moment. That moment came in the final sprint, he and Leechman are battling all the way, with people cheering all around. In the last 15 yards from the finish line, Curtis stumbles. He and Hayes are so close to each other I worry it’s going to throw him off, but Hayes seizes the opportunity and pulls ahead, crossing the finish at 16:13. Hayes is the Individual Virginia Division III state champion.

This is where things get interesting. We know Tandem’s top three are solid, and they are. Jack Blemker and Miles Griffith pull into the finish looking strong. But then it’s back and forth between us and Veritas. I find Jason surrounded by several of the JV runners who all have their phones out. They’re trying to calculate live. Holding the numbers of the Tandem boys to try and tally our score against Veritas. But it’s hard. People finish quickly, things happen fast, and you have to keep count. The official count won’t come until later. One runner is trying to tell Jason that he thinks we’ve got it, we’ve done it. Jason looks unsure. I can’t tell either. There’s a big gap where it seems several Veritas boys fly in and we’re waiting for Tandem’s number four.

Meanwhile, the girls are getting ready for their race. Even as they approach the starting line, I can feel that the focus is still on the score of the boys race. Still, the girls keep their focus. They stride and huddle. Laurel, a freshman, tells me she’s nervous, before she realizes her team has started a warmup lap and runs off to catch them. Their goal is to make it in the top ten teams. Lucy hopes to be all conference, which means coming in the top 20 finishers. Through the race, I keep trying to count her place.

At Panorama, you run through these wide open fields, on a winding course. As you near the finish there’s a big downhill to pick up speed and then a final hill to conquer. You’re exhausted at this point and this is where all the spectators gather to watch you. It can feel torturous. Once you crest the hill, you can see the end ahead of you and it’s flat, a perfect finish for a final battle or breakaway.

Rising over the hill, I catch something unexpected, though not unprecedented in Tandem XC history. Julia Glass, a junior, is running holding hands with someone on another team. Julia, who’s been coming back from an injury, was running when a girl near her fell on the course with half a mile to go. She wanted to drop out, but Julia helped her up and held her hand through to the finish.

After the girls race is over, results are announced. Dave, Tandem’s Athletic Director, shares, “Jason predicted that the boys would need to finish with less than 60 points in order to be crowned 2024 VISAA Cross Country State Champions... we scored 59 - and Veritas gave us everything they had - they scored 63!” For the second year in a row, Tandem XC claims 1st at States. Lucy ran a 22:33 and makes it in the top 20, a member of the Virginia all state team. The girls team comes in 5th place.


 I hope that part of the future of Tandem XC is a glorious girls team. I envision them having a whole page of their own in the yearbook, looking fierce and triumphant. The team today is young and hungry. I think in the next couple of years we’ll see them do amazing things.

The team at states (November, 2024)

Looking back over the past decade, Jason says, “In terms of the arc of it all, it’s…I think the reason I love patience and consistency is because that’s been true, that’s what it takes for any individual to reach their best but it’s also been true for the program.”

Jason says, “I think everybody wants the quick fix or the hack. There isn’t one. It’s consistency. You’ve got to do the work. You’ve just got to grind out the miles. You’ve got to be disciplined. Day in, day out, to be at that level, but that’s the thing! That’s not everyone’s goal and I don’t want it to be. Not everyone has to be that way. You’re just as important if your goal is to be out here and be a good teammate. I want them to know that running is something that they can have for the rest of their lives. It is a gift. It’s a tool that you can have to improve yourself mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually.”

Andy remarks, “I think Jason is a good example, and cross country, and Tandem in general, is a good example of taking the long view.” Day in and day out at practices and meets, you can’t sustain if all you’re doing it for is to win a championship. But if instead, or also, you’re there to, as Andy puts it, “celebrate being outside, celebrate being physically fit, maybe being a little bit competitive. Celebrate being together as a community,” those are the values that keep you showing up again and again, investing every day.

Ultimately, Jason says, running “can help you. You don’t have to be competitive. It’s not about winning or running PR’s. It’s just that running is a really healthy pursuit that can teach you a lot about life and help you stay mentally and physically balanced in a crazy world.”

Don’t you wish you could join Tandem XC? The beauty of running lies in its simplicity. Here’s the runner’s toolkit—all you need is a pair of sneakers, patience, and consistency.
 
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Tandem Friends School is a co-ed Quaker day school for grades 5-12 in Charlottesville, Virginia.
 
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