GREENSBORO — Another positive act of sportsmanship by a North Carolina High School Athletic Association athlete has been chronicled, and this time the parent of the recipient of the act wanted to make sure people were aware of it.
It occurred in late August in the Guilford City-County Cross Country Championships at Hagan Stone Park. Kaitlyn Lingard of Greensboro Day is running well late in the race, among the leaders, when she slips on a pine cone and goes down hard.
According to Tim Lingard, the parent of Kaitlyn, Austin Vass of Greensboro Page and Tori Churchill of Greensboro Grimsley stopped to help Lingard to her feet, with Vass actually turning around and going back to the fallen runner. Vass was in contention to win and finished second by less than two seconds to the winner, Alyssa Torres of Northwest Guilford.
Churchill finished fourth and Lingard fifth in the race.
Vass, who was selected by the Greensboro News and Record last year as its female cross country runner of the year, did not mention the incident in a post-race interview, according to the newspaper.
Mr. Lingard sought out Vass at another meet recently, just to thank her personally and give her a thank you letter. In a note to the Greensboro News and Record, he noted that “the real winner of this race was sportsmanship and those two ladies deserve all the good things that are sure to come their way. A proud and grateful parent, Tim Lingard.”
Our congratulations to these outstanding student-athletes who exemplify the true spirit of sportsmanship in our state.
