Ninth Time the "Charm" for Mora HS Boy's Team

The ninth time was the "charm" for the Mora boy's cross country team.  Last Saturday was the ninth straight trip for a Mora team to the MSHSL State Cross Country Championships Class A race, and their first time at the top of the podium.  It's been a long, steady climb.

Chris Goebel, the Mora coach, went to school at Albany, where he ran cross country and track, but never made it to the State Meet.  He had success in college at Concordia-Moorhead where he also earned a degree in elementary education and is a science specialist.  Teaching is rewarding, but Goebel also wanted  coach.  His opportunity came 14 years ago at Mora where his friend Jeremy Blake was coaching.

Noah Moravec(Orange shoes in front of a chase pack)  led the team at State.
Photo by Jim Ferstle

Blake took on Goebel as an assistant coach.  When Blake moved back to Moorhead to coach at the high school, Goebel took over as the head coach at Mora.  It was an easy transition as he and Blake shared the same coaching philosophy.  The piece that was missing at the time was the number of students who wanted to be a part of the teams.  The number of team members  has doubled since Goebel took over the program.  There are 40 in the high school program with 50 to 70 in the JV and varsity(7th through 12th grade).

"Once kids see what it's all about, see the success," said Goebel, the program begins to attract talented student athletes.  One of the distinguished alumni of the Mora HS program went on to make his name as a cross country skier. Chad Giese has dominated the local Mora Vasaloppett and was on several US Olympic ski teams.  His contribution to the Mora cross country running program, said Goebel, was a video that Giese made for the kids, offering them advice on being a successful athlete.

Being a local legend, the Mora HS and junior high kids "looked up to him," said Goebel.  It inspired some to come out for the team, and others already on the team to aspire to have their own lofty dreams.  Kids who were successful in the program, and were also from large families, "recruited by example" other family members to give cross country a try. All these are tried and true building blocks of many high school running programs, and they have worked for Mora.

"I love coaching and working and teaching in Mora," said Goebel.  "There's great family support(for the running program at the school), a really nice running community."  It's a good endurance sport community as well with the Vasaloppett.  The kids are exposed to, and can be inspired by, elite level endurance athletes, such as Giese. When the inspiration gets mixed with talent, good things happen.  Because this year's team is a "young team"--the top seven includes two juniors and one ninth grader along with four sophomores--their wasn't immediately obvious to others.

They started out the cross country season ranked tenth, but rose to second going into the State Meet.  Goebel didn't want to put pressure on them by focusing on the possibility of winning State, rather he gave them a time goal.  The top five were given the task of running under 17:15 at the State Meet.  Goebel thought if they were able to meet that goal they could win, and they did.by four points over runner-up Martin County West.

Now they are the inspiration, the trailblazers for the next generation of Mora High School cross country teams.