On Monday, May 3, 2010, the East track team defeated Lenape High School by 11 points in a track meet that established their first winning season in 21 years.

Obi Onejeme (’10), a prominent field event senior on the team, said of the experience, “It was a big meet coming in because if we didn’t win it, then we wouldn’t have had a winning season. We haven’t had a winning season since 1989. Lenape always beats us and they were expected to beat us.”

According to Onejeme, Washington Township, another talented track team that crushed East in a previous meet, beat Lenape by a mere six points, thus proving their alleged superiority.

However, Onejeme explains that the East runners were not intimidated: “We came there expecting to win because our coaches told us: … Don’t worry about how good the other guy is, just run your race [or] just throw.” The runners came in first place for many races.

A surprising first place win was in the 1600-meter, where Chris Dinh (’10) played the role of the underdog, running against one of Lenape’s best runners, but winning with approximately a twenty meter lead. Steve Omari (’11) also surprised the spectators, running an event he does not usually take part in, the 2400-meter. He ended up taking first place and adding to East’s first place wins. The successes of all the East runners yielded a satisfying win, which was finalized in the last event: the four by 400.

“It kind of sealed the deal,” said Onejeme. This year’s track team ran East out of its rut and into the glory of a beautiful winning season.