Gabrielle Ducharme is an ASU Cronkite School of Journalism student assigned to cover Camelback High School for AZ Preps365.

In a sport that is strictly defined by numbers, Madison Capehart and the Camelback cross-country team are defined by anything but that.

The captain is on a team that only has four girls: Yesina Valenzuela, Anabel Hernandez, Carrie Dashee and Capehart. The rules state that all cross-country teams must have five runners to qualify for states and place at meets. 

“To have these kids go out there, knowing that they literally can’t win, it is still really cool,” Camelback Athletic Director James Arndt said. 

Capehart is unfazed by the small size of her team and still believes she can lead her team to success, even if it does not show up in the final results.

During their first meet of the season, all four athletes finished in the top seven but they were all disqualified. Capehart believes her team will become close because they are small.

Capehart qualified for the California state championships in cross-country in 2018, but she won’t even get the chance to at Camelback, no matter how fast she runs.

Her high school career can be summarized in two numbers: four and three. In the last three years, Capehart has attended four different high schools, played three different sports and lived in three different states: California, Ohio and Arizona. 

Capehart was born in Ohio but grew up in California until seventh grade. Then the middle schooler moved back to Ohio and lived there until her junior year. In 2018, she moved back to Los Angeles for the first half of her junior year.

Then Capehart moved to Phoenix and began at Camelback in January 2019 where she has been thriving ever since. Despite all of the movement, sports have been the one constant in Capehart’s life. 

“Every school, I just joined the team and ran for fun, stay there as long as I can,” Capehart said. 

Capehart is a multi-sport athlete, running cross-country, track and playing soccer.  Her mornings are spent on the field training, evenings are spent working at Boston Market and nights are spent running on her own time.

“It’s about timing, I stay up really late everyday,” Capehart said. “Worst, probably 2 or 3 in the morning.” 

Capehart is a born leader.

“In Ohio, they didn’t have a girl’s soccer team, so I created one. They didn’t want me to play on a boy’s team,” Capehart said. “So I pushed for it.” 

Her future will most likely lead her to Arizona State where she hopes to continue her running career.