November 13, 2025

Written by Brad Peters

RIVERSIDE:  When Jude Abu-Ghazelah toes the starting line this Saturday at the CIF-SS Cross Country Prelims, she’ll peer up from chalk line and see the familiar layout of the famous three-mile course at Mt.SAC in Walnut stretching out before her.

Coach Alfonso Ibarra’s pre-race instructions will replay in her mind.  Butterflies will flitter in her stomach.  Her ears will pick out the words of encouragement shouted from her parents, two familiar voices filtered from the thousands that will watch and yell that morning.

A usual top-three scorer for King’s cross country team, Jude will do her part to help the Wolves earn one of the few slots for a CIF Finals berth on November 22.  It’s the first step in what they hope will be a return to the CIF State Championships Thanksgiving weekend.

Ranked 9th in D1 of the Southern Section, the Wolves should qualify for the Southern Section Finals,  but as they say, nothing is guaranteed.

For Jude, that’s not a cliche.  She’s lived it.

Jude’s parents, Tala and Nael, told me recently,   “When we watch her race, it is so much more than just a competition. Knowing everything she has been through, especially the surgery and the long road back. Every time we see her at the starting line, it feels like a victory.”

Back in early 2022, when most people were trying to figure out how to get back to normal after the Pandemic disrupted everything, Jude was trying to figure out how to get out of bed.  How to sit up. How to walk again.

Jude was born with a curvature of her spine and the doctors advised her parents that a “sooner rather than later” surgery was required.

“I was worried,” her dad said. “Worried for Jude and fear of the surgery and also for what her life would be like after,” he said. Those are words any parent can empathize with.  Her condition deteriorated during the COVID lockdown when hospitals were consumed with fighting the virus.

Tala chimed in.  “That was one of the most challenging times for [all of us].  The period leading up to the surgery was filled with anxiety about the risks and unknowns, how the procedure would go, whether there would be complications and what her long-term mobility would look like.”

In February of 2022, a permanent metal rod held with a handful of screws was placed along her spine, holding it along the vertical plane. 

Then the waiting began.

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The waiting that happens on the starting line of a cross country race can seem interminable.  “Runners set!” the Starter barks.  The runners lean forward, into the line, into the pause.  Its an anxious time; runners about to head off into the risk and unknown of a big race.  

Crack!  Smoke pulses from the pistol and they’re off, bolting from the line, jostling for position, thundering feet pounding the ground. 

The welling crowd yells: Let’s Goooo!

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“Go slow,” the doctors told her when they finally sent her home from the hospital back in ’22.  Recovery, she was told, would take time.  For starters? Bed rest, school done at home, no lifting anything heavy.   Take your time, Jude, take your time.

7th grader Jude wasn’t having any of it.  “She started jogging on her own way before she was supposed to,” Tala confessed.   

Coach Ibarra would meet 9th grader Jude in the summer of 2023, a full 16 months after the surgery and he noticed that tenacity right away.

He has nothing but praise.  “She has an incredible work ethic, never cuts corners and always looks for ways to improve,” Ibarra said.  She runs the distance events in track, and Head track coach Mat Vasel sees the same tenacity Ibarra does.

“She’s a fighter, she’ll grind out big race after big race,” Vasel told me.

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The go-big or go-home nature of the CIF Prelims makes this Saturday’s contest a “big race.”  Making it even more challenging, the course features two big hills.  The first starts after a flat first mile.  It’s a notorious grade named for the type of climb it is: Switchbacks.  The path snakes as it ascends.  Most of the way you can’t see the top.  When you think its done, it isn’t. 

At the peak, the pack has stretched out, like a yoyo that isn’t coming back. The grade humbles the fast starters.  The legs scream.  The mind dances between giving up and going on.   Though the race is only half over, reaching the summit feels like a victory.

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“We remember the small victories,” Tala said of the weeks that came after the surgery.  “The first time she sat up, although in deep pain, but determined; the first time she was able to walk down the hallway, in deep pain.  She showed her resilience through every step.”  

The first time Jude went running was a moment of serendipity during her time at John F Kennedy Elementary.  Her class was assigned to run laps around the field for the day’s activity.  She had fun and told her mom about it when she got home.  Within a week, she was asking for her mom to let her run after school, on her own.  She was 10.

“My wife gets all the credit for Jude’s running,” Nael told me,  “… and Jude’s running played an important role in her recovery as well, strengthening her passion and resolve to continue to run.”

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Descending off the Switchbacks, gassed and burning from the climb,  racers might be excused if they’re tempted to coast a bit.  The relatively flat second mile can be a time to recover, to gear up for the last hill that stands sentry in the third and final mile. The choice for each one is real: run that mile or race it.  To do the latter requires resolve.

Last year at the CIF Finals Jude’s resolve made the difference for King.  Bad allergies kicked in, making breathing — and thereby racing — difficult. Ibarra recalled that day, saying, “she found a way to stay composed and pushed through the pain to finish strong.  That effort ended up being one of the main contributors that [got us] to State. Watching her fight for her teammates was one of the most inspiring moments of our season.”

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She honed and sharpened that effort and resolve during six months of post-op recovery.  Jude was, and is, a learner;  its a skill she puts to use in her academics as much as she does to her running.  Her schedule is full of AP and Honors courses making her 4.2 GPA even more impressive.

I see her in class every morning. She smiles easily, leans forward to listen.  Clearly, in the classroom as on the course, she is applying the grit and grace she’s learned the hard way. Her backstory informs her posture.