Sustaining success in cross country is incredibly hard, particularly for high school athletes — by running so many miles on so many different terrains while their bodies are still growing, thriving with times and staying healthy can be a difficult path to navigate over four years.
James Wood senior Kate Konyar is certainly one of the best to ever do it in The Winchester Star coverage area.
Konyar is The Star’s Girls’ Cross Country Runner of the Year for the fourth consecutive year, making her the first person in the 36-year history of the award to earn the honor four times.
For every year of her career, Konyar — who has committed to run for NCAA Division I University of Maryland — has pretty much been in a class of her own locally.
She earned All-State honors (top 10) by placing fifth or higher at the Class 4 meet every year of her career. No other Winchester-Frederick County runner has placed higher than 14th in that time.
Her fastest 3.1-mile time each year was 32 seconds faster than anyone else as a freshman, 55 seconds better as a sophomore, 81 seconds better as a junior and 98 seconds better as a senior.
This year, Konyar ran faster than ever to shatter her school-record time by 17.5 seconds. At the Virginia Showcase at Pole Green Park at Mechanicsville on Oct. 18, Konyar ran a time of 17:44.2, which also appears to be the Frederick County record (2012 Millbrook graduate Crystal Nelson had a top time of 17:49). She followed that up by winning the Northwestern District title for the third straight year, then took third in both Region 4D and in Class 4.
After the Class 4 state meet, James Wood’s runners expressed how tight their bond was with each other and how much it helps them. The Colonels placed eighth in arguably the most competitive class in Virginia for cross country, and Konyar appreciates all the moments she’s had with her teammates. The bond goes beyond time spent at practice and meets — they often go to dinner, school events and to movies together.
“We’re all best friends,” Konyar said. “It’s the best team dynamic you can get. Being close with your team, I feel like you benefit from it so much [in competition]. Because having that support to lift you up is the best.”
Konyar also has significant appreciation for James Wood sixth-year head coach Matthew Lofton and assistant coach Hannah Chambers. Lofton said one of the great things about Konyar is that she’s only different from her teammates when it’s time for her to give her best effort in workouts and races.
“She’s just one of the other girls,” Lofton said. “She’s not, for lack of a better word, a superstar. She’s just goofing off with the other girls and hanging out with the other girls.
“But she just races so much faster. I don’t think James Wood’s going to see, I don’t think the area might see, someone like this come through in a while. And her records at James Wood, those are probably not going to be touched for a very long time.”
Konyar entered the 2025 season following a track season in which she broke a 12-year-old school record in the outdoor 3,200 meters by 7.11 seconds with a time of 10:57.96. She went on to win the Class 4 state title in that event.
Konyar started her cross country season off with a bang at the slightly shorter three-mile Central Invitational in Woodstock on Aug. 30. Konyar’s time of 17:43.9 was more than 21 seconds faster than she ran at last year’s Central Invitational, and she won by 67.4 seconds.
Konyar followed that up with a solid performance at the Dave Davis Invitational at Great Meadow in The Plains, taking second in 18:54 to two-time Class 3 state champion and junior Samantha Nitzsche of William Monroe.
Konyar’s third invitational race wasn’t to her liking. On Sept. 27 at the Oatlands Invitational — held at the Leesburg course where the state meet is held — Konyar took 11th in 18:53.96, almost 18 seconds slower than she ran last year and 61 seconds behind Nitzsche’s championship time.
In September, James Wood was engaging in workouts that were designed to prepare the Colonels for the postseason, and Konyar felt she was running with heavy legs at the time. Her first meet in October showed her she was on the right track.
On Oct. 4, Konyar captured her second straight Judges Classic at Kernstown Battlefield, and she did so with a time of 18:42.47 that was 10.27 seconds faster than last year. Konyar won the 109-girl race by 43.45 seconds.
“That was a super big confidence booster,” Konyar said. “After that, it was like, ‘Ok, we’re getting better. Hard training is paying off.'”
Two weeks later, Konyar was at the Virginia Showcase.
Konyar had never run in the event before because it’s always the same day as Millbrook’s Third Battle Invitational. But a month before the meet in September, she received an invitation from the meet director to compete.
She was immediately intrigued. The Virginia Showcase features a flat course and elite competition from not just all over Virginia but numerous other states like Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Maryland, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, West Virginia, Wisconsin and Washington, D.C. More than 250 schools and clubs competed in four varsity races for each gender this year.
“We usually don’t go too far for meets,” Konyar said. “But the years before I saw all the times from the [Virginia Showcase], and I was like, ‘Wow, they’re so fast. I want to be on a fast course.’ Around here, we don’t really get a lot of flat, fast courses. They’re usually really hilly. So I definitely wanted to go.”
Konyar has rarely had a lot of competition around her over the years, even in the races she hasn’t dominated en route to victory. That was not the case at the Virginia Showcase, and she took full advantage of the moment. In a field of 261 runners for the Girls’ Showcase race, Konyar placed 25th with her time of 17:44.2.
Konyar finished within four seconds of five other runners and had another runner finish less than three seconds behind her. Among Virginia runners, only eight were faster, including senior and two-time Class 4 state champion Elaina Pierce of Charlottesville, Nitzsche, and Pierce’s sophomore sister Juliana.
Much like competing in the Virginia Showcase for indoor track last year for the first time (Konyar didn’t participate in indoor track her freshman and sophomore years as a way to guard against potential injuries), Konyar said the event was an eye-opener. At the indoor showcase, Konyar placed fourth in the 3,200 in 11:03.62 — which at the time was a career-best — at the Virginia Beach Sports Center in January.
“You see so many amazing runners … obviously, I’m into the sport, but when I go to big meets like that, it’s so exciting,” Konyar said. “It’s when you realize you love what you do. Breaking [the 18-minute barrier] by that much was just mind-blowing to me. It was the best experience.”
Lofton didn’t go to the meet since the rest of the team was at Third Battle, but the 1,000-meter splits for the 5K race were updated live online. The entire team was watching, so excitement for Konyar was high from 135 miles away.
Lofton said the race was big for Konyar on multiple levels.
“I would say that race, and her finally being able to get in a race with competition on a fast course, really kind of changed her future in a way,” Lofton said. “It definitely brought more [colleges] to her. She wasn’t just under 18 minutes. She was under by 16 seconds, which is huge.”
Just five days after her historic performance, Konyar won the Northwestern District title on an alternate course at the Third Battle of Winchester Battlefield, finishing in 20:03.9 to win by almost a full minute. Konyar led the Colonels to their fifth straight district title.
The Region 4D meet was held on the course used for the Third Battle Invitational, with Konyar recording an 18:15 and finishing behind the Pierce sisters, with Juliana finishing five seconds ahead. Konyar led the Colonels to third place and their fourth straight state berth.
Konyar did beat Juliana earlier this season at the Oatlands Invitational, and Lofton thought Konyar could beat her again because he felt Konyar was better equipped to run on hillier courses.
He was right — Konyar ran more than five seconds faster than she did at the Oatlands Invitational. She pulled away and held off three runners who finished within nine seconds of Konyar, with Juliana Pierce taking sixth in 18:57.4, 9.4 seconds behind. Lofton said after the race it was the best he’s seen Konyar run in cross country when challenged.
“I think I responded to the challenge as best I could,” Konyar said. “I held off all of those girls that were behind me in our big pack. I think that’s the best I could have done. I kind of went with the competition, and then it paid off for me really well.”
For Winchester-Frederick County girls, Konyar appears to be the first to achieve four top-five state finishes since Sherando’s Robyn Ritter did so from 1995-98. Konyar’s second-place state finish last year was tops in program history and Winchester-Frederick County’s best at the state meet since Nelson was second in Group AA in 2011. She also took fourth in 2022 and fifth in 2023.
The two runners who finished ahead of Konyar at the state meet were Elaina Pierce and a newcomer, Hanover’s River Smith. The freshman finished almost 20 seconds ahead of Konyar in 18:28, but Konyar was able to beat Smith two weeks later.
On Nov. 22 at the Nike Cross Southeast Regionals, Konyar took 31st out of 246 runners in 18:17.7. Konyar beat Juliana Pearce by 16 seconds and Smith by almost 31 seconds. The Class 4 through Class 6 meets are all held at Oatlands on the same day, and Lofton said Konyar also ran faster at Nike Regionals than some other Virginia girls who ran faster state times than Konyar.
Konyar has a lot of running left to do before she heads to Maryland. But cross country is her favorite part of the running calendar, and she’s going to miss competing in the sport at James Wood.
Konyar grew up seeing her siblings each have success at running the trails for James Wood. Kenzie (class of 2020) had four top-11 state finishes to earn four state medals before running for NCAA Division I George Washington, and Kevin (class of 2018) went on to be an All-Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference runner for NCAA Division II Bloomsburg.
“To know I’m kind of living under what they left is everything,” Konyar said. “I know I’ve got to uphold that standard.”
Future runners will be hard-pressed to match Konyar’s achievements, but they’ll know how to carry themselves in training because of her.
“These girls who were ninth-graders this year can see, ‘OK, I’m doing the same things as Kate, and she’s this fast, and maybe I can get there, too,'” Lofton said. “She’s fast, very talented, and she works very hard. You can’t ask for much more than that out of an athlete.”
— Contact Robert Niedzwiecki at rniedzwiecki@winchesterstar.com
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