NORTH SHORE – Thanks to their outstanding achievements both athletically and academically, Newburyport’s Lucy Gagnon and Malden Catholic’s Cristian Rios have been honored as the Moynihan Lumber Student-Athletes of the Month for January. Click Here for Rios Podcast
Podcast – Lucy Gagnon – Newburyport High School with Bill Newell
Gagnon, a senior on the Newburyport High girls indoor track team, has put together a terrific season in which
she earned Cape Ann League Kinney Division Female Athlete of the Year honors, breaking multiple school records before eventually capturing the Division 4 state championship in the girls mile.
“This season was a lot of fun,” Gagnon said. “Especially because we had such a good team, we were able to accomplish a lot.”
In just her second season of indoor track, Gagnon has emerged as one of the program’s most accomplished athletes ever. Her Clipper teams have gone undefeated in dual meets each of the past two seasons, capturing the program’s first two CAL titles, and earlier this winter she helped lead Newburyport to its first Division 4 state relay title.
Individually, Gagnon was undefeated in the CAL in both the mile and 1,000-meter run and owns the school record in both events, plus the 4×400, 4×800 and distance medley relays. She won the league title in the mile by more than 17 seconds and helped capture the 4×800 as well, and at the Division 4 state meet she placed first in the mile (5:07.84) by nearly five seconds.
Most recently Gagnon placed sixth in the mile at All-States (5:11.28), good enough to qualify her for Saturday’s New England Championships at the Reggie Lewis Center in Boston. She was also the No. 1 runner on Newburyport girls cross country’s Division 4 EMass championship team last fall and is expected to remain one of the league’s top athletes in the upcoming outdoor track season as well.
Academically, Gagnon is just as impressive, ranking as one of the top students in her class while having already earned acceptance to MIT. Gagnon has also applied to Williams, Dartmouth and Harvard and hopes to run track at whichever school she attends.
“I just like to give it my best at whatever I do,” said Gagnon, who hopes to study biology in college. “I have to be careful about balancing my time, so if we have a later meet I need to get home and get my homework done first and make enough time as possible to also relax and prepare for races and practice.”
