Most high school runners only visit DeSales’ hilly course once a year, when the local area teams meet up for the annual DeSales Centaur Invitational. Northwestern’s Madelyn Consuelos is a bit more familiar with the course than most, and it showed on Saturday afternoon.

Consuelos, now entering her junior season for the Lady Tigers’ cross country team, was impressive over the weekend. She placed fourth in the 39th Annual DeSales Centaur Invitational, clocking a time of 20:46.94.

“I run this course a lot and I walk it a lot,” Consuelos said. “I really got to know how to run this course, [and] how to attack the hills. I’m very mentally strong on this course just because I know it so well.”

Other than Marian Catholic’s Tina Capparell, who won the competition in 19:20.93 (over a minute faster than anyone else), the rest of the field was pretty even. Consuelos was just 17 seconds behind second-place finisher Autumn Sands of Owen J. Roberts.

Knowing just how difficult DeSales’ course is after the first mile, which is mostly down hill, Consuelos wasn’t necessarily anticipating a personal best time on Saturday. Still, she might have hoped for a bit faster finish.

“I wasn’t too happy with my time, but I wasn’t expecting my fastest time since it is a hillier course,” Consuelos said.

While most of the 125 female runners sought a fast start out of the gate, Consuelos took more of a methodical approach. And when many runners started to lose pace in the midway part and second half of the course due to the DeSales’ daunting hills, Consuelos climbed further to the front.

“The first mile is just so fast because it is mostly downhill,” Consuelos said. “Everyone is just so excited. But once you enter the woods everything seems to calm down more. There’s not as many spectators, and you notice a lot more shifts in placing. I think the cornfield is where I definitely seem to kick it into the next gear. I know I have a mile left.”

There wasn’t just individual success over the weekend. The Lady Tigers placed third as a team as well, led by its top five finishers all placing in the top 31. Senior Molly Tarvin crossed the finish line next in 19th place in a time of 21:30.43. Freshman Kailyn Jones (24th), junior Alyssa Zack (25th) and junior Sarah Supplee (31st) rounded out Northwestern’s scorers. Hannah Herzon (42nd) and Kristen Brown (90th) also finished in the top 100 for the Tigers.

A number of Northwestern male runners finished with impressive outings as well. Senior Robert Leiser led the way with his 20th-place mark in 17:35.70. Senior teammate Phillip Castrine was close behind, coming in 26th place in a time of 17:58.47.

Freshman Kane Flickinger (70th), sophomore Joseph Pleban (95th) and junior Joseph Siberini (97th) rounded out the Northwestern boys top five, who placed 11th as a team. Randall Zack finished 107th for the Tiger boys team.

Stroudsburg captured first place as a team for the boys’ side, while Owen J. Roberts won on the girls’ side.