Cross country running is a sport that tests the physical and mental endurance of its athletes. Cross country takes its runners through water, ditches and hills. The runners are expected to keep their pace and energy through these obstacles.

Overall, cross country is one of the most mentally and physically challenging sports out there. One freshman here at Sage Creek exemplifies these features of a great runner. This special athlete is Max Marchi.  

Here at Sage Creek, the cross country team gets better and better each year. Every season, the team filters in new athletes including some very talented freshmen, including Marchi. This year, there are very high hopes for this select team of athletes because of the surplus amount of talent that has been added onto the team. 

Marchi, who has been running for around four years, brings new hope and talent to the cross country team. Marchi’s career started in his sixth grade year and has been exponentially growing ever since. 

“My parents were both runners and when we saw an add for the [Calavra Hills] cross country team, and I decided to join it, and it was really fun, so I kept with it,” Marchi said. 

Marchi wishes to follow in his parents’, who competed in the sport years back,  star runner footsteps. So far, his idea is going just to plan. Although Cross Country isn’t for the weak of mind or body, Marchi has nevertheless found joy in this grueling sport. 

“My favorite part about Cross Country is either the team bonding experience or the feeling you get after finishing a nice good workout,” Marchi explains. 

As Marchi says, having a strong team bond is crucial to a successful season. Marchi is helping establish just that. Between congratulating his team after a good race, or cheering them up after a bad one, Marchi will always put his time and effort into creating a strong team dynamic. 

“Being on a team with Max is really extraordinary. Whenever we’re at practice, he always lightens up the mood, and he’s a really fast runner. He races varsity sometimes,” Marchi’s teammate, Josiah Bowman said. 

But Marchi hasn’t always been this good. He’s been through ups and downs throughout his years of running. But there has been one major point of improvement for Marchi.

“My biggest improvement was probably in eighth grade track season when in the span of about two months, my mile time went from a 5:40 to a 4:56,” Marchi reminisces. 

Even through the variability of his running career, he has never lost hope that better times would come. Throughout all sports, motivation is key to improvement. 

Marchi takes this to heart and tries to find motivation wherever he can. But through and through, his biggest motivation will always be his teammates: 

“I always try and pace off of the faster teammates that I have on the varsity team because they’re faster and I want to be as fast as them so I can compete on their level.”  

Throughout his career, this motivational tactic has encouraged him to improve in this sport and others. Motivation keeps Marchi’s view on improvement stronger than ever. 

“My view on improvement is to make sure you don’t skip practice unless you desperately have to and put in as much work and effort as you can every single day,” Marchi said. 

Overall it isn’t the lightning-fast times or the impeccable endurance that makes Marchi a good athlete; it is the family-like community he brings to the team and his never-give-up attitude