Leah Rhode (12) and Frerichs hug on senior night. [Anna Olsen]

Lauren Frerichs, the reigning homecoming queen of Dowling Catholic High School, is a participant in the Cross Country team at Dowling as well as participating in basketball and track.

She has been running since 5th grade where she participated in track and field with her friends. Frerichs is on varsity for the cross country team and loves every minute of it. 

“This is my favorite sport as of right now,” Frerichs mentions.

She feels that cross country has a good sense of community and everyone is so supportive and nice.

“The thing I like most about cross country is the people,” Lauren adds with a smile.

Frerichs says that she has a huge idol she looks up to and that is Karissa Schweizer.

“She is very nice and definitely a good runner to look up to,” says Frerichs.

There are many meets the cross country girls attend and they are all 5ks which are 3.12 miles. The team spends a lot of time together since the meets do drag on for a while. 

“We spend about three hours at a meet because we have to warm up and watch the JV team and boys team as well,” Frerichs explains. 

Lauren has a favorite course and a course she is not very interested in.

“Fort Dodge and SE Polk are my favorite courses to run on, but Indianola is my least favorite just because of all the hills,” Frerichs says.

Frerichs says that she is still questioning whether or not to run in college. If she did, she still would not know what college she would want to run for.

“I’m on the verge as of right now,” says Frerichs.

When asked about how well the team was going to do at state, Frerichs looked up very confidently and gave a great answer. “We are definitely going to do well in the state meet and we are going to do well together.”

Sally Gaskell is a senior at DCHS and also participates in cross country. She has been running for about 3 years and loves every second. 

“I started running during COVID just to stay active and it’s been super fun.”

Cross country is her favorite sport but she does run track as well. Her favorite thing about cross country is her team. “I definitely love all the girls on my team and the atmosphere we’ve created.” 

She also has very nice things to say about her team and how she looks up to every single one of them. “All of my other teammates, especially the other seniors and juniors, are amazing. They all put in a lot of work and are really dedicated.”

Gaskell does have a specific course she loves and a course she thinks is not the best. 

“The course in Council Bluffs is definitely the worst for me. It has three loops so it got boring, which is probably not good since it was our district course this year. Marshalltown is my favorite because the course goes by so fast, and the vibes are really good there. Fort Dodge is also a staple. We’ve had a lot of experience on the course and it’s really flat,” says Gaskell.

Gaskell doesn’t do any specific winter training for cross country but she does do a lot of training for track season when it starts approaching in the winter.

The question about college came up and Gaskell hesitated a little bit but gave a very interesting but awesome answer. 

“I’m not sure if I’ll run for a college but I want to keep running on my own. I’ll probably train for a marathon or half marathon,” explains Gaskell.

Gaskell and Frerichs have made it to state and believe that their team will do amazing and they are very hopeful. They always work hard and are very glad they can run as a team in the state finals.