Andover’s Jared Ricke

By Hayden Swope

Jared Ricke, a cross country athlete from Andover, was chosen as the Shelter Insurance Athlete of the Month. Ricke had outstanding times his sophomore and junior year, and is ready to hit the course one last time for his senior year.

“I am honored to be selected as the athlete of the month,” Ricke said. “I want to thank my coaches for pushing me every day and my parents for always being supportive. I am thankful that they chose me out of all of the athletes.”

Besides track in the spring, Ricke kept up running all throughout summer as well. “For me, the cross country season started about a week after my track season ended back at the end of May,” Ricke said. “My goal over the summer was to be as consistent as possible with my training to get me ready. I ran about 40 to 50 miles a week for the whole summer.”

While going state is on his mind, Ricke has an even bigger goal to pass on his leadership to the underclassmen.

“Some goals I have for the season are to get on the top ten list of performances in Andover history and to make it to state,” Ricke said. “Another goal I had was to pass on the culture that Andover has had in years past. Andover has always been a school consistently good at cross country, and I would love to pass on the legacy.” Ricke hopes to continue running after high school, and go to school for engineering.

“I would love to keep running at the next level in college at a school with engineering,” Ricke said. “I’ve narrowed down the type of engineering I want to do, but I’m not sure exactly where I want to go.”