By Christie Nakagawa
The Woodbridge Invitational, a widely known race, took place on September 20, 2025 in the Great Park. Ava Diehl and Valentina Quilantan achieved 19th place, while Oliver Hunter, Zachary Williams, Jonathan Desormiers, and Gary Ikari got 15th place. On September 6, 2025, the cross country team had their second meet of the season here at Dana Hills High School. The last time Dana held this event was September 24, 2022. During the event, Caleb Kalfin stated, “There was a volunteer who was directing the lead biker to skip a last lap.” This was a messy mistake from the volunteer during the Varsity Boys race, causing the boys’ pacer to go right instead of the original route. This led 174 runners to run 2.1 miles instead of 3 miles, devastating many people. Senior Zachary Williams explained, “It was very crowded, the first turn was insane, I was getting shoved by people.” The route was harder for the runners because they had to avoid collisions with large groups while having to turn sharp corners, battling for their spot. Dana Hills is known for the cool weather, but this year was much hotter than usual. The girls were overwhelmed by the temperature and the stress from the boys’ race. Varsity runner Valentina Quilantan was proud of her team making an effort and getting new times. She remarked that, “My team went out there and did their best, and I noticed that most of us PRed. It is really special for us.” The flag football team is still searching for a breakthrough after another loss this week, making the overall season’s score 6-12. Despite winning a game this week against Temecula Prep, Patriots, they did lose to Mission Viejo, Diablos. In their most recent matchup against Temecula Prep Patriots, they scored three touchdowns with two interceptions. The defense and offense team held strong as senior captain, Kiera Rodriguez, got a touchdown in the first five seconds in the first quarter. Junior captain Zoe Freeborn also pulled many of the girls’ flags trying to get a touchdown. Ending the score with a total of 23-6 as the other team was only able to get one touchdown throughout the whole game. Head Coach Cosenza acknowledged the rocky start to the season but emphasized the team effort, saying, “We’re competing.”