All-Delco Cross Country: Fingerhut, Schwelm overwhelm as county’s best runners

UPPER PROVIDENCE — Penncrest’s Ruby Schwelm and Haverford High’s Ethan Fingerhut were destined to be runners.

Both come from running families.

Schwelm’s father, Bob, became an accomplished distance runner after playing soccer in college at Franklin & Marshall and is the co-owner of the Bryn Mawr Running Club.

“It’s nice having him there, my own coach,” Ruby Schwelm said of her father.

Fingerhut’s father, Randy, ran track in high school and his older brother, Josh, was a two-time All-Delco selection in cross country for the Fords, who now runs track and cross country at Washington & Lee University in Virginia.

“They’ve been running my whole life,” Ethan Fingerhut said. “I picked up on it.”

This year, Schwelm, a freshman, and Fingerhut, a senior, took their careers to new heights, earning medals at the PIAA Class 3A cross country championships and being named Runners of the Year to highlight the 2021 Daily Times All-Delco Cross Country team.

Joining Schwelm and Fingerhut on the All-Delco team are: Rowe Crawford, Hannah Prokup and Gwyneth Stach from Strath Haven, Camryn McGeehan of Haverford, Therese Trainer of Notre Dame and Kathryn Lynn from Episcopal Academy for the girls; Haverford High’s Patrick Lawson and Quentin Ryan, Luke Rodden and Jimmy Kutz from Radnor, Gavin Mogck of Penncrest and Strath Haven’s Benjamin Ent for the boys.

The team was selected by the Daily Times sports staff after consultation with county coaches.

Crawford and Trainer are the only repeat selections from 2019, the last time the team was chosen. Crawford, Lynn, Stach, Kurtz and Ent are seniors. Trainer, Ryan, Lawson and Mogck are juniors. Prokup and Rodden are sophomores and McGeehan is a freshman.

Schwelm is the first freshman to earn Runner of the Year honors since Sacred Heart’s Emma Seifried in 2014 and the first female from Penncrest to receive the honor since Chrissy Boyd went back-to-back in 1998 and 1999.

Fingerhut is the third Haverford athlete to earn Runner of the Year honors on the boys side, joining Mike Donnelly (2018) and Ed Donnelly (2009), who are not related.

As a freshman running varsity for the first time, Schwelm said she didn’t have high expectations, yet she went out and won the first three races of her career. She won the Northampton Invitational and took first in the only two Central League dual meets she ran in.

“I just wanted to see how things went,” Schwelm said “I ended up doing better than expected.”

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