Nashoba boys leave winter tracks to top.

Byline: Rick Eggleston

COLUMN: Cross Country

In running, as in life, it's often the little things that can make all the difference.

Perhaps no team exemplifies that better than the cross country tour de force that is Nashoba Regional. The defending Mid-Wach B and Central Mass. Division 1 playoff champs once again are rolling with a spotless 6-0 record.

"Winter track," Nashoba coach Don Gribbons said when asked the key to having success in the fall. "Having winter track at Nashoba has made all the difference. It allows the kids to continue the season and work on so many of the little things."

Despite the graduation of 2007 T&G Super Teamer and Central Mass. individual champion Anthony Raduazo, now running at Williams College, the Chieftains simply have reloaded this season behind the 1-2 punch of juniors Coby Horowitz and Brendon Aylaian.

"We lost Anthony, but we knew we had two excellent runners in Coby and Brendon," Gribbons said. "Right now, we have to run better as a team behind them."

With the addition of a winter track program at the school three years ago, Horowitz, Aylaian and the rest of the Chieftains have known no other way.

And for the second straight season, they've done nothing but win dual meets, the latest of which saw the Chieftains hand Westboro High its first loss behind Horowitz's Bolton course-record time of 15 minutes, 52 seconds - a mark previously shared by Aylaian and Raduazo.

That win came on the heels of an impressive performance at last weekend's Bob McIntyre Invitational in Boston, where Aylaian nipped Horowitz, as the duo finished the Division 1 race in first and second place while the Chieftains wound up fourth overall as a team.

According to Gribbons, while Aylaian has been the team's No. 1 finisher this season, Horowitz - a soccer refugee - has closed the gap quickly on his teammate.

"Brandon entered the season in tremendous shape," Gribbons said, "and Coby did everything he needed to do during the summer."

Still, if the Chieftains - also led by senior...