Two standouts on the Boston Latin Track and Cross Country (XC) team, Thomas White (I) and Lucy Abdow (I), will pursue their athletic careers at the collegiate level.

White has officially committed to run at Bucknell University. He first got into running in sophomore year and was immediately hooked. Although White only just recently started to run seriously, he has been focused on athletics since he was ten, saying, “I was definitely more of a soccer guy for the majority of my life. I had been playing soccer for about four years at BLS (eighth-tenth).” When he started “realizing [he] wasn’t necessarily the best soccer player,” he found his calling as a member of the Latin XC team during his junior year.

White loves to run with his friends, conversing about anything and everything, such as “what everyone on the boys’ and girls’ team’s role would be in the Star Wars universe.” As he continues his running career, he has many goals, one of which is simply to get back on the track with his team, another to “hopefully get some school records (especially ones that my friends currently hold).”

Looking forward, White can’t wait to meet his new teammates and proudly represent BLS and his hometown of South Boston in the National Collegiate Athletic Association.

Abdow will continue her running career at Northeastern University. Like White, Abdow started as a soccer player. At a young age, however, she realized she didn’t enjoy the soccer drills and footwork, only looking forward to playing games where she could run up and down the field. At just eight years old, she was already competing in local 5Ks and mile races.

She joined track in eighth grade, initially as a member of the sprint team, then eventually switched to mid-distance and XC. She has found outstanding success on the team, leading the 4×800 meter relay to win All-State Championships and the Emerging Elite New Balance National Championship.

Abdow says her biggest individual achievements are her “600-meter race at Divisionals in the winter of 2020. I placed and hit a [personal record] PR so I was really happy with how I performed that day. I was also really proud to be named MVP for my junior year, indoor season.”

Adbow began to think about running at the collegiate level in her junior year. Luckily, she was able to meet with a few coaches before the pandemic hit. COVID-19, however, still threw an obstacle in her recruitment process. She had to meet with coaches and athletes online instead. Abdow also says, “with half of my junior year season cut short, I missed a lot of racing opportunities that I was banking on for some new PRs. This made the process a bit more difficult because I didn’t have the times that I had planned to hit, and I worried this would affect my status as a recruit.”

Abdow decided on Northeastern because she knew it would fit her both athletically and academically. She was especially drawn to their co-op program, where students can work a full-time job for a semester.

Abdow will train hard, getting a strong base mileage and weightlifting, in order to prepare for her first college season. She is grateful for the confidence and friendship that the BLS team has given her, and she says she hopes to leave behind a legacy of “hard work, dedication and friendship on the BLS XC and track team.”